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“Not a day goes by that I don’t curse my reporter parents for infecting me with journalism and wish there were absolutely any other job in the world I could do with the same passion I have for this dreadful career.”

The latest: After days of Conway questioning his mental health, Trump called Conway the “husband from hell.”

Kellyanne Conway offers her love to C-SPAN

“Happy 40th Birthday! @cspan A national treasure.”

Will Kellyanne choose her husband or President Trump?

“Trump makes Republicans choose him or their principles. Makes Lindsay Graham choose him over his dear friend John McCain. Makes Kellyanne Conway choose him or her husband. The loyalty tests never, ever end. And the choice shouldn’t even be hard.” — Amanda Carpenter, CNN.

Bill Kristol’s love letter to Trump

“Dear @realDonaldTrump, You’re wrong. None of us who know George refers to him as Mr. Kellyanne Conway. Nor is he jealous or angry. He is concerned for our country’s well-being, as he should be, given whom we have as our president. As ever, Your slightly dangerous correspondent.” — Bill Kristol, editor-at-large, The Bulwark.

CNN reporter says Trump’s rhetoric is getting even more dangerous for the media

“Imagine if the leader of any other country tweeted this. Hard to believe we would not say it was a threat to the free press. Trump’s rhetoric continues to inch further and further into dangerous waters.” — Oliver Darcy, media reporter, CNN.

What Trump tweeted Tuesday: “The Fake News Media has NEVER been more Dishonest or Corrupt than it is right now. There has never been a time like this in American History. Very exciting but also, very sad! Fake News is the absolute Enemy of the People and our Country itself!”

Ben Smith is distraught over someone accusing one of his BFFs of being “alt-right”

“Don’t accuse people of being alt-right unless you have evidence. Especially if it happens to be one of my best friends.” — Ben Smith, digital media guy, formerly with The Washington Examiner and The Daily Caller. “That’s one way to ruin a happy hour.”

People are dunking on Amy Schumer after she revealed that her hubby is on the spectrum

“Why are people being so nasty about Amy Schumer revealing her husband is on the Autism Spectrum? I know this is Twitter but I’m horrified that her honest discussion about her husband has been met with mean comments.” — Yashar Ali, writer, HuffPost, New York Mag.

Politico Playbook is under new management

Maybe this will spice things up a little?

In a note in Playbook Tuesday, they announced that Blake Hounshell, who ran Politico Mag, will once again assume the role of editorial director and will manage and edit Politico Playbook, helmed by Jake Sherman, Anna Palmer and Daniel Lippman. Lippman also reports for other newsletters. Steve Heuser will run the magazine.

Speaking of human poop …Lauren Sanchez‘s bro emotes about his deal with the National Enquirer in which he spilled his sis’s dirty texts with lover Jeff Bezos for $200K. He claims he never sent the d*ick pics. He just sent a bunch of other steamy texts for thousands of dollars and kindly left those out. Who believes that? Here.

What she said: “They keep blaming America for the sin of slavery but the truth is, throughout human history, slavery existed, and America came along as the first country to end it within 150 years. And we get no credit for that to move forward and try to make good on that.”

Lisa Kennedy Montgomery, who hosts “Kennedy” on Fox News Business, quickly pushed back, saying, “Well, we did have a very bloody Civil War.”

CNN’s Don Lemon hosted an entire panel on the topic Tuesday night that included American Urban Radio‘s White House correspondent April Ryan, presidential historian Douglas Brinkley and political commentator Mike Shields. “Anytime people talk about slavery not being very bad … raises eyebrows. …It’s sad that she isn’t more educated and offers that gobbledygook on our airwaves.” Ryan added, “Ignorance. She needs to read.” Ryan also said Pavlich needs to go see a slavery exhibit. Shields also weighed in, saying, “When you want make a Hitler or Nazi analogy, just stop. …when you feel that welling up, when you don’t know what you’re talking about, slavery is the worst thing we ever did. …There was a war. People died.”

Lemon told viewers that Pavlich “walked back” her remarks, saying that the U.S. was among various countries to end slavery, but was the first. Pavlich: “My point is that we were the country that decided to end it, and we’re still dealing with the issue. But if you want to start a problem and inflame racial tension even more, start blaming people who have nothing to do with slavery for the sin of slavery, that is not fair, it’s not the American way, and we shouldn’t be doing it.”

Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) is keeping things weird… the surfing congresswoman is struggling to keep her congressional seat let alone win a bid to be the Democratic presidential candidate in 2020. Jane Kleeb, chair of the Nebraska Democratic Party, toldPolitico: “Anybody I know, any leader I know, just thinks she’s weird.”

In view of C-SPAN’s 40th anniversary, The Atlantic‘s David Graham dares to suggest a darker side to the network everyone in Washington loves. I asked Howard Mortman what he thought about the piece. I’ll bring his response to you if he has one. Here.

Former McCain aide hits back at Trump

“Ok you aren’t a fan. One more in a long list of things you are not.HonestBraveSmartToughDisciplinedKindGenerousPatrioticA fan of John McCainHad you been a fan, the Senator would have wondered what he had done so wrong that he earned the approval of a man he despised.”

— Mark Salter, former top aide to the late Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.).

Meghan McCain pipes up on Tuesday night

“As my father always used to say to me – Illegitimi non-carborundum.”

— ABC “The View” co-host Meghan McCain.

Meghan McCain gives Wendy Williams a thumbs up for her brave admission

“Sending strength and love to you @WendyWilliams — speaking your truth and showing your struggle and darkness on national television is not for the weak of heart.” — McCain on talk show host Wendy Williams admitting that she’s living at a sober house.

Travel Bitches

“Guys & gals, I’m flying Spirit Airlines for the first time this week, and I’ve never been more scared to fly than I am right now.” — Siraj Hashmi, Washington Examiner.

“In VF, Beto objects to NYT story on NY years, which he says depicts him as ‘aimless & depressed.’ Words he used w/ me: ‘rootless,’ ‘sad case,’ ‘in the dumps.’ Anyway. Will be interesting to watch him process coverage as POTUS contender, not TX underdog.” — Matt Flegenheimer, NYT. Read that story here.

“Is Instagram still down? Bc after 2 months almost furnitureless in DC I am trying to take you all on the riveting adventure of getting: a chair. (Also, if you had to start a new apt from scratch, what would be the first 5 pieces of furniture/items you would get? Asking for me.)” — Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.). (RELATED:

MSNBC’s Chris Matthews has other thrill up his leg

“Chris Matthews is feeling that thrill up his leg again!!!! ‘That cover is the best kiss I’ve seen for a candidate in a long time.’” — Cameron Cawthorne, media reporter, Washington Free Beacon.

“Beto O’Rourke has to be careful that he doesn’t come across as too self-absorbed, too full of his own persona.” — John Harwood, MSNBC on Wednesday afternoon.

Rolling Stone writer apologizes for coming across as ‘uber-privileged’

“A lot of people have made some excellent points about how this came off as tone-deaf/uber-privileged and I acknowledge and apologize for that! My alma mater is one of like 3-4 things I do truly love in the world so I wanted to give it a lil shoutout but yes, I see how it came off. Also Lena Dunham was one of the first people I ever interviewed (for the Oberlin review, natch) and while I think she is *problematic* she was EXTREMELY nice and funny and charming and i am overall proud she is an ambassador for our weird little community. This is a v. earnest tweet so I apologize in advance, but the whole college admissions scandal makes me feel lucky to have graduated from a place like @oberline. Everyone I went to school with was smart and passionate and engaged, and most importantly had a great deal of integrity.” — EJ Dickson, Rolling Stone.

Meawnwhile, WaPo has been eviscerating FNC host Tucker Carlson for old interviews he had with shock jock Bubba The Love Sponge. WaPo‘s “reported” opinion blogger Erik Wemple detests Carlson. At least part of that is based on the fact that Wemple absolutely bombed on Carlson’s show. Wemple’s bug-eyed expression has now been turned into a coffee mug that Carlson’s gives to guests and friends.

Media Matters prez… wrote about “Japs, Jewry and Trannies” in a blog he said was a failed attempt at satire. Here.

“Stormy Daniels, doing a live Q&A in DC tonight, says she is not a ‘slut,’ she just has ‘a friendly vagina.’”

— Kate Bennett, CNN, regarding Stormy Daniel’s appearance at The Wing Tuesday night in Washington. At this event, she told the female crowd that President Trump‘s former lawyer Michael Cohen is “as dumb as herpes.”

In other Stormy Daniels news… she dumped her lawyer, Michael Avenatti: “I have retained Clark Brewster as my personal lawyer and have asked him and his firm to review all legal matters involving me. Upon completion of Mr. Brewster’s review and further consultation with me, I anticipate Mr. Brewster will serve as my primary counsel on all legal issues.”

“Just got an e-mail with 26 words of content and 371 words of automatically generated pseudo-legal garbage at the end. This is a PLAGUE. None of this crap has any legal effect at all; you can not impose an obligation to delete an e-mail, for example.” — Lane Greene, language columnist, editor, The Economist.

Yashar’s father, Baba, gaining steam online

“If you told me five years ago that my dad would be popular on Twitter without being on Twitter, I wouldn’t have believed it.” — Yashar Ali, HuffPost, New York Mag.

Bette Midler has a filthy mouth

“The corpse of C. Boyden Gray appeared on cunt-y #TuckerCarlson’s show tonight. Such admiration on both sides, really takes one’s breath away. Since it takes one to know one, guess Clayland is a cunt too. How do you like it now, asshole?” — Bette Midler, lefty, actress, singer.

Sen. Menendez pushes free press unless it applies to himself

BOB MENENDEZ (D-Fla.): “Despite the Trump Admin’s dangerous rhetoric, a free press will NEVER be the enemy of the people. In the spirit of #SunshineWeek we must work to make gov’t more transparent and to protect the journalists dedicated to holding those in power accountable.”

HENRY RODGERS, TheDC: “Remember that time you threatened to call the police on me for asking you if you would vote for the Green New Deal last month? I’m a credentialed reporter… So this applies to me as well, right?”

Josh Greenman, New York Daily News opinion editor: “I went to an elite college and generally thought/think highly of my classmates. But I’ve worked for 20-ish years alongside tons of people from all kinds of schools. Many of my smartest and best colleagues went to decidedly not-elite places. Elite schools’ rep is vastly inflated.”

Peter Savodnik, journalist, author: “Tweeting that you went to an elite school and that it’s not actually that elite is peak elitism.”

Editor: Giants GM may be ‘mentally retarded’

“I can’t anymore … I tried to blog for work, but the Giants being an epic dumpster fire has distracted me to no end. I go to bed angry. we all know what’s at the end of the road, Giants fans: more pain, another disastrous season, and a GM who might mentally retarded.” — Matt Vespa, associate editor, Townhall.

Journo has insomnia brought on by time change

“The Daylight Savings Time switch has made me infinitely happier in the early evenings, but it’s also brought a vicious strand of insomnia that I can’t beat.” — Scott Nover, freelance writer, The Atlantic.

Cernovich loves the thrill, dread of ice baths

“Ice baths / cold plunges…. they always suck. Been doing them for years. Know it won’t kill me. But there’s always that sense of dread beforehand. That’s why the training is effective. It’s a metaphor for life. The fear of the thing is always greater than the thing. Jump in!” — Mike Cernovich, filmmaker, conservative commentator.

Journo has anxiety

“What do people who aren’t mentally cataloging their every anxiety even think about at night?” — Katie MacBride, associate editor, Anxy. Formerly, Rolling Stone, The Daily Beast.

Geraldo defends Tucker Carlson

“Concerted efforts to take down @TuckerCarlson using ancient comments on shock jock radio is another sad attack on First Amendment-If I examined every word uttered by all of you over last 10 years-i am sure my search would turn up some salty or unsavory dicta-Let’s move on Move on.” — Geraldo Rivera, FNC.

Gossip Roundup

Ex-Florida massage parlor owner Li “Cindy Yang’s purpose in life was to party. So says her mom. Here.

“For the record, I think @colton ⁦‪is one of greatest Bachelors of all time! #TheBachelor.” — Mike Fleiss, creator, ABC’s The Bachelor.

Rosie O’Donnell’s explosive news… She says she was sexually abused by her father. Naturally she revealed this in an interview with Variety about her new book about ABC’s “The View.” The book is called, Ladies Who Punch: The Explosive Inside Story of The View. Her father died in 2015. Here. And here.

Lori Lightfoot, left, and Toni Preckwinkle, right, will face each other in an April 2 runoff.

Two African-American women clinched the top two spots in Chicago’s mayoral election Tuesday, meaning they will face each other in a runoff to become the Windy City’s first black female mayor.

Lori Lightfoot and Toni Preckwinkle beat 12 other candidates — including William Daley, son of former Mayor Richard Daley — but neither grabbed more than 50 percent of the vote, meaning there will be a runoff in April to succeed outgoing Mayor Rahm Emanuel.

According to The Chicago Tribune, unofficial results showed Lightfoot with 17.5 percent, Preckwinkle with 16 percent and Daley with 14.7 percent. Chicago has had a female mayor before, and an African-American mayor, but never an African-American woman as a mayor.

"What do you think of us now?" Lightfoot told supporters Tuesday night. "This is what change looks like."

She later congratulated Preckwinkle for reaching the runoff: "No matter which one of us wins, Chicago will make history on April 2nd by electing the first Black woman mayor. It’s long overdue," she tweeted.

Lightfoot, a political outsider and the first openly gay woman to run for Chicago mayor, was the subject of an early apparent shot from Preckwinkle, a former City Council member and public school teacher, over her lack of political experience.

"It’s not enough to stand at a podium and talk about what you want to see happen," Preckwinkle said. "You have to come to this job with the capacity and the capability to make your vision a reality."

According to the Tribune, Lightfoot had positioned herself as the progressive voice against an entrenched Chicago political machine, while Preckwinkle pitched herself as someone with a track record of taking on powerful interests.

“We may not yet be at the finish line, but we should acknowledge that history is being made,” Preckwinkle said in Hyde Part, according to the Tribune. “It’s clear we’re at a defining moment in our city’s history, but the challenges that our city faces are not simply ideological. It’s not enough to say Chicago stands at a crossroads. We need to fight to change its course.”

Turnout was low, with The Associated Press reporting that by late afternoon turnout was around 27 percent of registered voters. The prior low was 33.8 percent in 2007.

Lightfoot and Preckwinkle had both been critical of the city’s response to the 2014 police shooting of black teenager Laquan McDonald. Emanuel’s popularity dropped after the release of video of McDonald’s shooting, and he eventually decided not to seek re-election.

Michael Cohen, President Trump’s former attorney, testifies before the House Oversight and Reform Committee on Wednesday, and is expected to accuse the commander-in-chief of knowing his long-time adviser Roger Stone was reaching out to WikiLeaks about the publication of stolen Democratic National Committee emails.

Cohen, who released his prepared opening statement ahead of his House hearing, apparently will not claim Trump directed those communications.

Cohen was disbarred in New York on Tuesday – the same day he testified behind closed doors before the Senate Intelligence Committee. He is slated to report to prison next month to serve three years time.

Michael Cohen has been disbarred in New York, with a court ruling that President Trump’s former lawyer’s guilty plea in Robert Mueller’s investigation automatically stripped him of his eligibility to practice law.

The court’s decision Tuesday came while he was on Capitol Hill, testifying behind closed doors before the House Intelligence Committee. He plans to testify in an open House Oversight Committee hearing on Wednesday.

Neither a spokesperson for Cohen nor for the New York Courts responded to Fox News’ request for comment on the decision.

Cohen, in November, pleaded guilty to lying to Congress about a Trump real estate project in Russia as part of Mueller’s investigation into Russian meddling and potential collusion with Trump campaign associates.

The guilty plea was related directly to his August 2017 testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee about a plan to build a Trump Tower in Moscow, giving lawmakers a “false” description of the Moscow Project. Cohen also testified, at the time, that all communications with Russia regarding the project ended in January 2016, prior to the Iowa Caucuses—the first contest in the presidential race—but later admitted communications continued through June 2016 when Trump became the Republican nominee.

Cohen is slated to report to prison next month to serve three years time.

Trump slammed Cohen on Tuesday, saying he was “lying” as part of the investigation to reduce his allotted prison time.

“Michael Cohen was one of many lawyers who represented me (unfortunately). He had other clients also. He was just disbarred by the State Supreme Court for lying & fraud. He did bad things unrelated to Trump. He is lying in order to reduce his prison time. Using Crooked’s lawyer!” Trump tweeted, noting that Cohen was represented by longtime Clinton ally Lanny Davis.

Cohen has been under criminal investigation as part of a grand jury probe into his personal business dealings, including his tax business and bank fraud, since April, when the FBI raided his home, office, and hotel room to seize a collection of documents as part of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York’s criminal probe.

In August, Cohen pleaded guilty to five counts of tax evasion, one count of making false statements to a financial institution, one count of willfully causing an unlawful corporate contribution, and one count of making an excessive campaign contribution. The excessive campaign contribution was regarding the $130,000 payment made to Stormy Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, in the weeks leading up to the 2016 presidential election in exchange for her silence about an alleged one-time sexual encounter with Trump.

Ivanka Trump said Tuesday that she supports a minimum wage, but doesn’t back handouts for those “unwilling to work.”

Trump made the statement in a Twitter post in response to a Yahoo News article that asserted Trump was challenging a minimum-wage platform pitched by U.S. Rep. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y.

“No I did not,” Trump wrote in response to the Yahoo headline. “I support a minimum wage. I do not however believe in a minimum guarantee for people ‘unwilling to work’ which was the question asked of me.”

“I support a minimum wage. I do not however believe in a minimum guarantee for people ‘unwilling to work’ which was the question asked of me.”

Trump later wrote about her recent efforts to assist American workers.

“I’ve spent much of the last 2 years focused on inclusive economic growth via workforce development and skills training as well as pro-working family policies such as the doubled Child Tax Credit & CCDBG,” Trump wrote.

On Monday, Trump had told Fox News host Steve Hilton – for an interview that will air on Sunday’s “The Next Revolution” — that she believed many Americans would reject a minimum wage for people who are unwilling to work, seeing it as a form of handout.

“I don’t think most Americans, in their heart, want to be given something,” Trump said. “I’ve spent a lot of time traveling around this country over the last four years. People want to work for what they get.

"I don’t think most Americans, in their heart, want to be given something. I’ve spent a lot of time traveling around this country over the last four years. People want to work for what they get."

“So, I think that this idea of a guaranteed minimum is not something most people want. They want the ability to be able to secure a job. They want the ability to live in a country where’s there’s the potential for upward mobility.”

Earlier Tuesday, Trump’s excerpted Monday remarks had prompted Ocasio-Cortez to respond that Trump had only a “2nd-hand” understanding of work.

“As a person who actually worked for tips & hourly wages in my life, instead of having to learn about it 2nd-hand, I can tell you that most people want to be paid enough to live,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote. “A living wage isn’t a gift, it’s a right. Workers are often paid far less than the value they create.”

The freshman congresswoman then cited data from the Economic Policy Institute claiming that the gap between productivity and a typical worker’s pay had increased dramatically since 1973 – around the time of the Arab oil embargo.

According to the Hill, guaranteed pay for those unwilling to work was a proposal listed on a Green New Deal fact sheet that Ocasio-Cortez’s office said was released in error and did not appear in the actual bill submitted to the House.

President Donald Trump slammed Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., as "Da Nang Dick" in a tweet Wednesday, calling out the senator’s false claims of having fought in the Vietnam War. (AP, File)

President Donald Trump attacked Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., on Twitter early Wednesday during his visit to Vietnam, referring to him as “Da Nang Dick”—a nickname mocking the senator’s false claim of having fought in the Vietnam War.

Trump had been touring Vietnam and meeting with the country’s leaders ahead of his summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Hanoi when the president excoriated the Democratic senator.

“I have now spent more time in Vietnam than Da Nang Dick Blumenthal, the third rate Senator from Connecticut (how is Connecticut doing?)” Trump wrote. “His war stories of his heroism in Vietnam were a total fraud – he was never even there. We talked about it today with Vietnamese leaders!”

Blumenthal, who was elected to the Senate in 2010, regularly referenced his supposed Vietnam service in the 2000s, when he was Connecticut attorney general.

“I served during the Vietnam era,” Blumenthal reportedly said at a Vietnam War memorial in 2008. “I remember the taunts, the insults, sometimes even the physical abuse.”

Democratic donor Ed Buck is seen with Hillary Clinton in 2016. Gemmel Moore, who died inside Buck’s home, is seen at right. (Facebook)

The mother of a man who died in the West Hollywood apartment of prominent Democratic Party donor Ed Buck filed a wrongful-death lawsuit Tuesday.

LaTisha Nixon, who reportedly names Buck and the Los Angeles County District Attorney as defendants in the lawsuit, said she grew frustrated after authorities failed to file criminal charges for the 2017 overdose death of her 26-year-old son Gemmel Moore.

Moore, a black male escort, was found by police on July 27, 2017, inside the 63-year-old’s apartment. Moore’s death was initially classified as an accidental methamphetamine overdose.

Buck, a well-known figure in LGBT political circles, has given more than $500,000 to a range of Democratic groups and candidates — including Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti.

According to NBC4, the suit was filed in LA Superior Court and alleges wrongful death, sexual battery, hate violence, drug dealer liability, negligence, infliction of emotional distress, and two violations of civil rights. Nixon also accuses Buck of personally administering the drug that took her son’s life.

Buck’s attorney Seymour Amster said they did not yet see the lawsuit but vowed to “fight the allegations vigorously,” adding that there’s “more to the story than is being told.”

Moore’s death was initially considered an accidental drug overdose. After an additional inquiry due to writings in Moore’s journal and pressure from his family, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office concluded that the “admissible evidence is insufficient to prove beyond a reasonable doubt” that Buck gave Moore drugs or is responsible for his death.

Last month, a second black man, Timothy Dean, was found dead of an overdose in Buck’s home. Dean, 55, reportedly had a relationship with Buck years before Moore’s death.

Dean reportedly warned his friends to steer clear of Buck and referred to him as a "f—ing devil" and "a horrible, horrible man.”

President Trump had landed in Vietnam for his summit with Kim Jong Un. This second meeting will put to the test whether North Korea actually plans to take any concrete steps toward giving up nuclear weapons, or whether its dictator is merely pursuing a strategy of deflection and delay. At stake: the potential elimination of one of the world’s premier nuclear threats, and a possible peace treaty more than six decades after the Korean War armistice.

But that was no match for Michael Cohen.

The president’s onetime lawyer had arrived in the Senate yesterday to testify behind closed doors, a prelude to his televised House hearing today.

MSNBC literally had a split-screen shot of Trump getting off the plane in Hanoi and Cohen walking down a Capitol Hill hallway.

CNN had a countdown clock up, 23 hours before his public testimony.

Cohen was already making news as the gist of his planned testimony was provided in advance to major news organizations. And that gave his story, well, a nuclear boost.

Cohen, The New York Times said, "is planning on portraying his onetime client in starkly negative terms when he testifies Wednesday before a House committee, and on describing what he says was Mr. Trump’s use of racist language, lies about his wealth and possible criminal conduct."

Cohen, The Washington Post said, "is expected to describe to lawmakers what he views as Trump’s ‘lies, racism and cheating,’ both as president and in private business, and will describe ‘personal, behind-the-scenes’ interactions he witnessed, a person familiar with the matter said."

And even while the president was halfway around the world, his White House was playing defense on the other story with a statement from Sarah Sanders:

"Disgraced felon Michael Cohen is going to prison for lying to Congress and making other false statements. Sadly, he will go before Congress this week and we can expect more of the same. It’s laughable that anyone would take a convicted liar like Cohen at his word, and pathetic to see him given yet another opportunity to spread his lies."

What’s fascinating about that statement is that it’s the Republican chairman of the Senate Intel committee, Richard Burr, who summoned Cohen. And Robert Mueller is relying on Cohen’s accounts as well.

Of course, Cohen’s credibility will come under withering assault, since he pleaded guilty to lying to Congress. That’s part of the reason that Cohen will begin a three-year prison term in May, though he may hope his testimony prompts prosecutors to ask for a sentence reduction.

Cohen’s effort at rehabilitating his image is simple: I lied before to protect my client, but I deeply regret it and am so upset by Trump’s conduct as president that I’m going to tell all now.

Among his topics, according to the advance leaks: the infamous Trump Tower meeting with a Russian lawyer, and the president’s involvement in hush-money payments to Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal.

His lawyer, Lanny Davis, told the Times that he will "back it up with documents."

But Cohen does not plan to answer questions about other aspects of the Russia investigation to avoid interfering with the Mueller probe.

What the Post described as the hope of Cohen’s allies — that "he could become this generation’s John Dean" — very much remains to be seen. Dean, unlike Cohen, worked in the White House and was an integral part of Richard Nixon’s Watergate coverup.

The third story unfolding on our screens yesterday was Nancy Pelosi’s plan for the House to vote on blocking Trump’s declaration of a national emergency at the border. So while he’s performing on the world stage, he could get whacked here at home for supposedly flouting the Constitution.

By the time the House voted to block Trump 245-182, with 13 Republicans joining the Dems, the party-line tally was a foregone conclusion. There is a chance that the Senate will go along with four Republicans defecting (Thom Tillis said in a Post op-ed yesterday that he’d oppose the national emergency because "conservatives rightfully cried foul when President Barack Obama used executive action to completely bypass Congress"). Still, there undoubtedly wouldn’t be enough votes to overturn a veto.

Of course, the summit meeting with Kim hadn’t actually begun when these other stories were grabbing ink and airtime. But I can’t help thinking that most of the media are more interested in Trump’s former fixer and a potential Democratic slapdown than in this president’s diplomacy.

Former Trump campaign staffer Alva Johnson broke down in tears Tuesday night while explaining her accusations that President Trump “forcibly kissed” her during the 2016 election.

Johnson, who has filed a lawsuit against the president, told MSNBC she’d joined the Trump campaign because she believed the White House needed a “businessman” despite thinking he “didn’t have a chance of winning.” She described her role as an “outreach” director in Alabama, where she organized “one of the largest rallies” at the time with then-Sen. Jeff Sessions in attendance.

Johnson said in August 2016, she briefly interacted with then-candidate Trump on an RV during a campaign stop in Florida. Before he stepped off the bus to speak with campaign interns, she told him to “go kick ass” and said she hadn’t seen her family in a very long time. And, after he told her he wouldn’t “let you down,” Johnson said Trump held her hand and began getting closer.

“I was just kinda frozen. I didn’t know how to process it. I knew it was inappropriate because I worked in human resources. So I knew that it was completely inappropriate,” Johnson continued. “It was gross and creepy. Like I could sometimes still see those lips.”

“This accusation is absurd on its face. This never happened and is directly contradicted by multiple highly credible eye witness accounts,” White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said Monday.

Johnson rejected Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi’s denial that she witnessed the alleged interaction after naming her as one of two witnesses, insisting Bondi’s statement was “not true.”

Following the alleged interaction, Johnson said she “pushed it” in the back of her mind and continued doing her job, but it wasn’t until the October 2016 release of the “Access Hollywood” tape that prompted her to leave the campaign. “When I heard the audio, I was, like, screaming in my car. I’m like, ‘oh my God, that’s exactly what he did to me.’ Like, he literally described exactly what he did to me, minus the grab the ‘P,’” Johnson said.

She told Hayes she was “afraid” to tell the campaign why she was leaving and that she sought a lawyer as other women came forward with allegations against Trump, but “for business reasons” didn’t carry on with her case.

When asked why she waited so long to bring the lawsuit and for offering praise for the president in 2017 as well as applying for a position at the White House, Johnson pointed to a nondisclosure agreement she signed, which she claimed made it feel like her “vocal cords had been clipped for years.”

Johnson started getting tearful while describing the “guilt” she felt after the 2017 protest violence in Charlottesville, Va., and the separations of migrant families last year.

“Then you have him mocking women with the #MeToo movement, making fun of them and for me, I’m sitting there and I’m like, this is exactly what you did to me, and I don’t want to keep my mouth shut,” an emotional Johnson told Hayes.

Calling it an existential crisis facing the world, she said on “AM Joy,” “We as human beings have within our power the ability to change our behavior not in drastic ways, by the way, to reduce the effects of climate change.”

She said that the world must act with a sense of urgency because people are in collective peril.

She called the Trump administration a failure for not thinking about the future where climate’s concerned, focused on science fiction rather than on science fact.

Harris, D-Calif., joined Sens. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Cory Booker, D-N.J. to co-sponsor the Green New Deal resolution earlier this month. The resolution’s awkward rollout included the release of an official document by New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s office that promised economic security even for those “unwilling to work,” as well as the elimination of “farting cows” and air travel.

“Why is the press standing by as the First Amendment erodes?” Tucker Carlson asked Trump Jr.

“The majority of the press are now left-wing activists,” Trump Jr. told Carlson. “They are not on the side that is being stymied, they’re not on the side that is being oppressed.”

Trump Jr. began the interview by talking about his troubles with Instagram and how many of his followers informed him that social media platforms were censoring their content because of their conservative nature.

“I can do this because I have a big platform. I have a big soapbox, I can get it out there, but some of the little guys, they can’t,” Trump Jr. said. “They don’t have the ability. They end up just taking it.”

Trump Jr. went after “Big Tech” in an op-ed last Friday claiming some companies have been acting in a partisan manner to try preventing President Trump’s reelection.

“Unfortunately, Silicon Valley is showing us that tech companies, too, can manipulate information for partisan ends. Their censorship is increasing at an alarming rate, just in time for them to try to spoil my father’s re-election bid, but we won’t let them get away with it.,” Trump Jr. wrote.

He called the alleged social-media manipulation a “one-way systematic attack on free speech” while talking to Carlson.

President Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen said Tuesday that the American people can decide "exactly who is telling the truth" when he testifies Wednesday before the House Oversight and Reform Committee — but in a remarkable social media post on the eve of the hearing, a top Republican suggested that lurid details of Cohen’s private life may take center stage.

Cohen, once Trump’s loyal attorney and fixer, has turned on his former boss and has cooperated with Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation.

"I look forward to tomorrow, to be able to in my voice to tell the American people my story," Cohen told reporters Tuesday.

He made the comments after meeting with the Senate Intelligence Committee for more than nine hours behind closed doors. Cohen said he appreciated the opportunity to "clear the record and tell the truth" to the Senate committee, after acknowledging he’d lied to the panel in 2017.

Tuesday was the first of three consecutive days of congressional appearances scheduled for Cohen. After the public hearing Wednesday, he will appear before the House intelligence panel Thursday, again speaking in private.

Cohen’s public testimony is likely to be a spectacle, in part because of the accusations he plans to level against the president. He’ll give lawmakers a behind-the-scenes account of what he will claim is Trump’s lying, racism and cheating, and possibly even criminal conduct, according to a person with knowledge of the matter. He is expected to provide what he will claim is evidence, in the form of documents, said the person, who requested anonymity to discuss the confidential testimony.

Republicans are expected to aggressively attempt to discredit Cohen, given that he has acknowledged lying previously. White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said in a statement Tuesday it was "laughable that anyone would take a convicted liar like Cohen at his word, and pathetic to see him given yet another opportunity to spread his lies."

It appeared unlikely Cohen would directly implicate Trump in instructing his subordinates to lie. Buzzfeed News last month published a bombshell, discredited report, citing two law enforcement officials, who said Cohen acknowledged to Mueller’s office that Trump told him to lie to Congress about a potential real estate deal in Moscow, and claim that the negotiations ended months before they did so as to conceal Trump’s involvement.

But Mueller issued his first public statement in more than a year to repudiate the BuzzFeed report just 24 hours after its publication, flatly asserting that the story was "not accurate." The Washington Post has since reported that Mueller intended his rare denial to mean that the story was "almost entirely incorrect," and that the Special Counsel’s Office immediately "reviewed evidence to determine if there were any documents or witness interviews like those described, reaching out to those they thought might have a stake in the case. They found none."

One Republican House member, meanwhile, did more than just question Cohen’s credibility in the run-up to the hearing on Wednesday. Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz tweeted Tuesday that the world is "about to learn a lot" about Cohen and suggested he knew of disparaging information that could come out during his testimony.

Gaetz, a Trump ally who talks to the president frequently, is not a member of the committee that will question Cohen. He did not offer any evidence. Still, the tweet was extraordinary because his remarks appeared to some Democrats to constitute threatening or intimidating a witness.

Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz defended a tweet he sent Tuesday about Michael Cohen, suggesting that President Trump’s former attorney had been unfaithful to his wife. (Getty/AP)

In a tweet, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wrote, "I encourage all Members to be mindful that comments made on social media or in the press can adversely affect the ability of House Committees to obtain the truthful and complete information necessary to fulfill their duties."

Pelosi went on to suggest that Gaetz may have even opened himself to legal liability, warning that the Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause — which provides virtually absolute legal immunity to statements made by senators and representatives during congressional debates — might not protect Gaetz, who made his comments away from the House floor.

"We’re witness testing, not witness tampering," Gaetz countered in an interview with reporters. "When witnesses come before Congress, their truthfulness and veracity are in question and we have the opportunity to test them."

Lanny Davis, one of Cohen’s lawyers, said in a statement that he wouldn’t respond to Gaetz’s "despicable lies and personal smears, except to say we trust that his colleagues in the House, both Republicans and Democrats, will repudiate his words and his conduct."

Democrats have been alternately suspicious of Cohen and eager to hear what he has to say. Sen. Mark Warner, the intelligence panel’s top Democrat, suggested in a brief statement to reporters outside Tuesday’s interview that Cohen had provided important information.

"Two years ago when this investigation started I said it may be the most important thing I am involved in in my public life in the Senate, and nothing I’ve heard today dissuades me from that view," Warner said.

Senators on the intelligence panel attended Tuesday’s private meeting, a departure from the committee’s usual practice, where witness interviews are conducted by staff only. The Senate intel panel’s chairman, Richard Burr, suggested to The Associated Press before the meeting that his committee would take steps to ensure that Cohen was telling the truth.

"I’m sure there will be some questions we know the answers to, so we’ll test him to see whether in fact he’ll be truthful this time," Burr said.

At least one Republican member of the intelligence panel refused to go to the meeting. "I don’t have any desire to go listen to a lying lawyer," said Texas Sen. John Cornyn.

In addition to lying to Congress, Cohen pleaded guilty last year to campaign finance violations for his involvement in payments to two women who allege they had affairs with Trump.

Federal prosecutors in New York have said Trump directed Cohen to arrange the payments to buy the silence of adult film star Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal in the run-up to the 2016 campaign. Cohen told a judge that he agreed to cover up Trump’s "dirty deeds" out of "blind loyalty."

Trump denies the allegations and says Cohen lied to get a lighter sentence.

The person with knowledge of what Cohen intends to tell Congress said he will provide information about Trump’s financial statements that he will claim shows Trump deflated assets to pay lower taxes on golf courses; will provide details of the Daniels payment and claim that Trump organized a cover-up by pretending Cohen would be repaid; and claim that Trump talked to him and asked him questions about the Trump Moscow project throughout 2016.

He is also expected to discuss what he knows about a meeting between Trump campaign associates and a Russian lawyer in Trump Tower before the 2016 election, a matter that is of particular interest to Mueller and congressional investigators.

Cohen is not expected to discuss matters related to Russia in the public hearing, saving that information for the closed-door interviews with the intelligence committees. House Oversight and Reform Chairman Elijah Cummings has said he doesn’t want to interfere with Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election and links to Trump’s campaign.

Members of the oversight panel are expected to ask questions about the campaign finance violations, Trump’s business practices and compliance with tax laws and "the accuracy of the president’s public statements," according to a memo laying out the scope of the hearing.

Fox News’ Chad Pergram and Elizabeth Zwirz and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

In his testimony before the House Oversight and Reform Committe Wednesday, Michael Cohen will accuse his former client, President Trump, of knowing that his adviser Roger Stone was reaching out to Wikileaks concerning the publication of stolen Democratic National Committee emails.

According to his prepared remarks, first obtained by Politico, Cohen will tell Congress that Trump "was a presidential candidate who knew that Roger Stone was talking with Julian Assange about a WikiLeaks drop of Democratic National Committee emails."

Cohen will also call Trump a "racist," a "conman," and a "cheat," all based, he will claim, on "documents that are irrefutable."

Among those documents Cohen will purportedly provide Congress: "A copy of a check Mr. Trump wrote from his personal bank account – after he became president – to reimburse me for the hush money payments I made to cover up his affair with an adult film star and prevent damage to his campaign," as well as "Copies of financial statements for 2011 – 2013 that he gave to such institutions as Deutsche Bank."

Additionally, Cohen will offer "a copy of an article with Mr. Trump’s handwriting on it that reported on the auction of a portrait of himself – he arranged for the bidder ahead of time and then reimbursed the bidder from the account of his non-profit charitable foundation, with the picture now hanging in one of his country clubs."

Cohen also claims he will provide "Copies of letters I wrote at Mr. Trump’s direction that threatened his high school, colleges, and the College Board not to release his grades or SAT scores."

Cohen, once Trump’s loyal attorney and fixer, has turned on his former boss and has cooperated with Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation.

"I look forward to tomorrow, to be able to in my voice to tell the American people my story," Cohen told reporters Tuesday.

He made the comments after meeting with the Senate Intelligence Committee for more than nine hours behind closed doors. Cohen said he appreciated the opportunity to "clear the record and tell the truth" to the Senate committee, after acknowledging he’d lied to the panel in 2017.

Tuesday was the first of three consecutive days of congressional appearances scheduled for Cohen. After the public hearing Wednesday, he will appear before the House intelligence panel Thursday, again speaking in private.

Cohen’s public testimony is likely to be a spectacle, in part because of the accusations he plans to level against the president. He’ll give lawmakers a behind-the-scenes account of what he will claim is Trump’s lying, racism and cheating, and possibly even criminal conduct, according to a person with knowledge of the matter. He is expected to provide what he will claim is evidence, in the form of documents, said the person, who requested anonymity to discuss the confidential testimony.

Republicans are expected to aggressively attempt to discredit Cohen, given that he has acknowledged lying previously. White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said in a statement Tuesday it was "laughable that anyone would take a convicted liar like Cohen at his word, and pathetic to see him given yet another opportunity to spread his lies."

It appeared unlikely Cohen would directly implicate Trump in instructing his subordinates to lie. Buzzfeed News last month published a bombshell, discredited report, citing two law enforcement officials, who said Cohen acknowledged to Mueller’s office that Trump told him to lie to Congress about a potential real estate deal in Moscow, and claim that the negotiations ended months before they did so as to conceal Trump’s involvement.

But Mueller issued his first public statement in more than a year to repudiate the BuzzFeed report just 24 hours after its publication, flatly asserting that the story was "not accurate." The Washington Post has since reported that Mueller intended his rare denial to mean that the story was "almost entirely incorrect," and that the Special Counsel’s Office immediately "reviewed evidence to determine if there were any documents or witness interviews like those described, reaching out to those they thought might have a stake in the case. They found none."

One Republican House member, meanwhile, did more than just question Cohen’s credibility in the run-up to the hearing on Wednesday. Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz tweeted Tuesday that the world is "about to learn a lot" about Cohen and suggested he knew of disparaging information that could come out during his testimony.

Gaetz, a Trump ally who talks to the president frequently, is not a member of the committee that will question Cohen. He did not offer any evidence. Still, the tweet was extraordinary because his remarks appeared to some Democrats to constitute threatening or intimidating a witness.

Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz defended a tweet he sent Tuesday about Michael Cohen, suggesting that President Trump’s former attorney had been unfaithful to his wife. (Getty/AP)

In a tweet, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wrote, "I encourage all Members to be mindful that comments made on social media or in the press can adversely affect the ability of House Committees to obtain the truthful and complete information necessary to fulfill their duties."

Pelosi went on to suggest that Gaetz may have even opened himself to legal liability, warning that the Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause — which provides virtually absolute legal immunity to statements made by senators and representatives during congressional debates — might not protect Gaetz, who made his comments away from the House floor.

"We’re witness testing, not witness tampering," Gaetz countered in an interview with reporters. "When witnesses come before Congress, their truthfulness and veracity are in question and we have the opportunity to test them."

Lanny Davis, one of Cohen’s lawyers, said in a statement that he wouldn’t respond to Gaetz’s "despicable lies and personal smears, except to say we trust that his colleagues in the House, both Republicans and Democrats, will repudiate his words and his conduct."

Democrats have been alternately suspicious of Cohen and eager to hear what he has to say. Sen. Mark Warner, the intelligence panel’s top Democrat, suggested in a brief statement to reporters outside Tuesday’s interview that Cohen had provided important information.

"Two years ago when this investigation started I said it may be the most important thing I am involved in in my public life in the Senate, and nothing I’ve heard today dissuades me from that view," Warner said.

Senators on the intelligence panel attended Tuesday’s private meeting, a departure from the committee’s usual practice, where witness interviews are conducted by staff only. The Senate intel panel’s chairman, Richard Burr, suggested to The Associated Press before the meeting that his committee would take steps to ensure that Cohen was telling the truth.

"I’m sure there will be some questions we know the answers to, so we’ll test him to see whether in fact he’ll be truthful this time," Burr said.

At least one Republican member of the intelligence panel refused to go to the meeting. "I don’t have any desire to go listen to a lying lawyer," said Texas Sen. John Cornyn.

In addition to lying to Congress, Cohen pleaded guilty last year to campaign finance violations for his involvement in payments to two women who allege they had affairs with Trump.

Federal prosecutors in New York have said Trump directed Cohen to arrange the payments to buy the silence of adult film star Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal in the run-up to the 2016 campaign. Cohen told a judge that he agreed to cover up Trump’s "dirty deeds" out of "blind loyalty."

Trump denies the allegations and says Cohen lied to get a lighter sentence.

The person with knowledge of what Cohen intends to tell Congress said he will provide information about Trump’s financial statements that he will claim shows Trump deflated assets to pay lower taxes on golf courses; will provide details of the Daniels payment and claim that Trump organized a cover-up by pretending Cohen would be repaid; and claim that Trump talked to him and asked him questions about the Trump Moscow project throughout 2016.

He is also expected to discuss what he knows about a meeting between Trump campaign associates and a Russian lawyer in Trump Tower before the 2016 election, a matter that is of particular interest to Mueller and congressional investigators.

Cohen is not expected to discuss matters related to Russia in the public hearing, saving that information for the closed-door interviews with the intelligence committees. House Oversight and Reform Chairman Elijah Cummings has said he doesn’t want to interfere with Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election and links to Trump’s campaign.

Members of the oversight panel are expected to ask questions about the campaign finance violations, Trump’s business practices and compliance with tax laws and "the accuracy of the president’s public statements," according to a memo laying out the scope of the hearing.

Fox News’ Chad Pergram and Elizabeth Zwirz and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

House Republicans on Tuesday claimed a small victory over the Democrats’ climate change agenda by holding a rare successful vote as the minority to end an oversight hearing, saying that the subject of global warming was outside the committee’s jurisdiction.

The Republicans in the Natural Resources Committee’s oversight panel won in a 4-2 vote to end the hearing, simply because there weren’t more than two Democrats present.

Rep. Louie Gohmert of Texas, the top Republican on the Oversight and Investigations subcommittee, called for the vote after laying out the case that climate change was not within the jurisdiction of the committee, based on its charter and bylaws.

Gohmert called for a vote to adjourn following his opening remarks, and a roll call vote was held. Witnesses at the hearing were not introduced before the Republicans left the hearing room.

With the Republicans in adjournment, the Democrats were forced to change the proceedings from a hearing to a "forum," which Rep. T.J. Cox of California, the chairman of the oversight panel, opened by introducing the speakers.

The full committee’s top Republican, Rep. Rob Bishop of Utah, had raised the jurisdiction issues at the beginning of the month when the Democratic leadership launched its sweeping series of hearings on climate change. Bishop also said the Democrats were not properly giving notice to Republican members on the topics of the hearing.

Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz defended a tweet he sent Tuesday about Michael Cohen, suggesting that President Trump’s former attorney had been unfaithful to his wife. (Getty/AP)

Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz defended a tweet he sent Tuesday about Michael Cohen, suggesting that President Trump’s former attorney had been unfaithful to his wife.

Tweeting directly at Cohen, the Republican congressman wrote: “Do your wife & father-in-law know about your girlfriends? Maybe tonight would be a good time for that chat. I wonder if she’ll remain faithful when you’re in prison. She’s about to learn a lot…”

When asked about his tweet by reporters on Tuesday, Gaetz insisted that his remarks were not witness tampering, according to The Hill.

"We’re witness testing not witness tampering," Gaetz explained. "And when witnesses come before Congress their truthfulness and veracity are in question and we have the opportunity to test them."

His testimony Tuesday to the Senate Intelligence Committee took place behind closed doors. On Wednesday, he’ll testify before the House Oversight Committee in an open hearing. The following day, Cohen is set to appear behind closed doors for a House Intelligence Committee interview.

Cohen was sentenced in December to three years in prison after pleading guilty to campaign finance violations, tax evasion and lying to Congress. He agreed to cooperate with prosecutors as part of a deal.

Lanny J. Davis, who represents Cohen, slammed Gaetz’s tweet as a shameful lie and one that would not sit well with the Floridians whom the lawmaker represents.

"We will not respond to Mr. Gaetz’s despicable lies and personal smears, except to say we trust that his colleagues in the House, both Republicans and Democrats, will repudiate his words and his conduct,” Davis said in a statement to Fox News.

“I also trust that his constituents will not appreciate that their congressman has set a new low — which in today’s political culture is hard to imagine as possible,” he continued.

In addition to his tweet, Gaetz also addressed Cohen on the House floor on Tuesday night, painting him as a repeated liar.

“I guess tomorrow we will find out if there is anyone that Michael Cohen hasn’t lied to,” Gaetz said. “We already know he lied to Congress, we already know he lied to law enforcement, lied to the IRS, lied to three banks and he’s going to prison for his lies. And so I guess it will be relevant for us to determine like, does he lie to his own family? Does he lie to his financier’s? Does he lie to his financiers who are members of his family?”

Gaetz, who is not a member of the oversight committee, also called Cohen’s credibility into question.

“And it’ll be one heck of an inquiry for us because this is someone who has tangled such a web of lies that he is not to be believed and I think it is entirely appropriate for any member of this body to challenge the truthfulness and veracity and character for the people who have a history of lying and have a future that undoubtedly contains nothing but lies,” Gaetz continued on the floor. “That is the story of Michael Cohen, we’ll see it play out tomorrow. And I, for one, can’t wait to the get to the bottom of things, and can’t wait to get to the truth.”

Presidential candidate Kamala Harris made some bold statements in an interview on Tuesday, calling for the decriminalization of sex work and labeling President Trump a racist.

“When you’re talking about consenting adults, I think that yes, we should really consider that we can’t criminalize consensual behavior, as long as no one is being harmed," Senator Harris, D-Calif., told The Root. "But at the point that anyone is being harmed or exploited, then we have to understand that’s a different matter."

When asked if she thought sex work should be decriminalized, Harris said: “I think so. I do.”

She added, however, that the issue “is not as simple as that.”

“There is an ecosystem around that, that includes crimes that harm people,” Harris said. “I do not believe that anybody who hurts another human being or profits off of their exploitation should be … free of criminal prosecution."

“Well look, when you talk about his statement [responding to the violence protests in Charlottesville, Virginia], when you talk about him calling African countries ‘s—hole’ countries, when you talk about him referring to immigrants as racists and murderers, I don’t think you can reach any other conclusions,” Harris responded

Starr asked Harris again if she “definitely” agreed that the president was a racist.

“I do, yes. Yes.” Harris said.

For his part, in discussing his comments about undocumented immigrants being “murderers” and “rapists,” Trump has insisted he was talking specifically about MS-13 gang members and criminals.

But the issue that has garnered Trump the lion’s share of criticism may be his reaction to the Charlottesville protests, during which neo-Nazis and white nationalists in Charlottesville marched and a counterprotester was fatally hit by a car.

Democrats on Tuesday pushed unprecedented legislation through the House to block President Trump’s national emergency declaration to steer billions of extra dollars to his southern border wall, raising the prospect that Trump might issue his first-ever veto to defeat the effort.

Monday’s vote marked the first time the House or Senate has tried to terminate a presidential declaration of a national emergency, using the provisions of the National Emergencies Act of 1976. Former Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., attempted a similar effort regarding a national emergency declared by then-President George W. Bush, but the measure never came to a vote on the House floor.

Should enough Republicans in the GOP-controlled Senate defect and support the House bill, a two-thirds supermajority in both the Senate and House would be needed to override Trump’s veto. The White House issued a formal veto threat Tuesday ahead of the House vote, ramping up pressure on Republicans to hold the line.

It took President George W. Bush more than five years before he used his veto, and President Barack Obama only 11 months. For President Bill Clinton, it took two and a half years.

With three Senate Republicans saying they would support the legislation, only one more was needed to vote with all the Democrats to pass the measure and send it to Trump.

House Democrats have aimed to block the national emergency declaration that President Trump issued last week to fund his long-sought wall along the U.S-Mexico border, setting up a fight that could result in Trump’s first-ever veto. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

"When you see the vote today there will be nowhere near the votes to override a veto," House GOP Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., told reporters.

Even many GOP lawmakers who have viewed themselves as protectors of Congress’ power of the purse said they would defer to Trump in this case, saying he has the authority under a mid-1970s statute.

Democratic leaders said the vote was not about the merits of Trump’s wall but how Trump was trampling on the Constitution by grabbing money that he couldn’t obtain through the usual means.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said Trump’s action "steals billions of dollars" from military construction projects— including, possibly, family housing and child care centers — to build the wall along the Mexico border.

Republicans have countered that problems with drug runners and human trafficking gave merit to Trump’s maneuver.

"I went down there neutral on this question, didn’t know whether or not I’d support a national emergency," said Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., who recently returned from a National Guard deployment along the border in Arizona. "And, I came back more convinced than probably anybody that this is the right thing to do."

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of N.Y., seen here on Tuesday, said Trump was trying to "bend the law" with his declaration of a national emergency on the southern border. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

"If Republicans vote their beliefs, we’ll get a lot. If they vote their party, we won’t get a lot," said House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md.

Trump on Monday urged Senate Republicans to stick with him.

"I hope our great Republican Senators don’t get led down the path of weak and ineffective Border Security," Trump tweeted. "Without strong Borders, we don’t have a Country — and the voters are on board with us. Be strong and smart, don’t fall into the Democrats ‘trap’ of Open Borders and Crime!"

Vice President Mike Pence discussed the issue with GOP senators during their weekly private lunch. In a statement after the sit-down, South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham accused Democrats of hypocritically changing their mind about realities on the southern border.

“We had a great presentation from Vice President Pence and his team regarding the emergency declaration and the need for additional spending to protect our southern border," Graham said. "The Vice President made a compelling case that the border crisis is real and President Trump has both the authority and legal backing to declare a national emergency."

Graham added: "In 2014, President Obama declared a humanitarian crisis at our southern border because 120,000 unaccompanied minors were apprehended. As of today, we have already apprehended 120,000 in Fiscal Year 2019. The problems of 2014 are only getting worse."

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York said Trump was trying to "bend the law" with his declaration of a national emergency on the southern border. He called on lawmakers to "speak up with one bipartisan voice" to put a check on the executive branch as the founding founders envisioned.

Acting Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan, center, and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Joseph Dunford, second from the right, during a tour of the U.S.-Mexico border at Santa Teresa Station in Sunland Park, N.M., on Saturday. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)

"What would stop a future president from claiming an emergency every week?" he asked.

On Monday, GOP Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., said he would vote to block the order, joining Maine’s Susan Collins and Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski as Republicans supporting the resolution. Congress must defend its power of the purse and warned that a future Democrat in the White House might abuse the power to advance "radical policies," Tillis said.

Another Republican, Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, called Trump’s order "unnecessary, unwise, and inconsistent with the United States Constitution and I’ll decide how to vote when I’m presented with something to vote on."

Senate voting on Trump’s emergency order could drag under a rarely used procedure, which an aide said is possibly a first for the chamber. The law allows for up to 15 days of committee review— in this case, at the Armed Services panel — with a full Senate vote three days later. Senators, though, said the process could be expedited.

At issue is Trump’s longstanding vow to build a wall along the 1,900-mile southwest border, perhaps his top campaign promise. He has long since dropped any pretense that money for the wall would come from Mexico, which he once claimed would be the source of funding.

Earlier this month Congress approved a huge spending bill providing nearly $1.4 billion to build 55 miles of border barriers in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley, ending a dispute that had led to a record 35-day partial shutdown of the government. Trump had demanded $5.7 billion to construct more than 200 miles.

Trump’s declaration of a national emergency gives him access to about $3.6 billion in funding for military construction projects to divert to border fencing. Lawmakers in both parties are recoiling at the politically toxic prospect of losing cherished projects at back-home military bases. The Defense Department has not identified which projects may face the ax.

But, the administration is more likely to tap $600 million from a federal asset forfeiture fund first. In addition, it is considering shifting more than $2 billion from Defense Department accounts into a Pentagon counter-drug fund to be tapped for wall construction.

Trump’s edict is also being challenged in the federal courts, where a host of Democratic-led states such as California are among those that have sued to overturn the order. The House may also join in.

A Democratic member of Maryland’s House of Delegates was removed as chairwoman of a subcommittee on Tuesday after an account of her using a racial slur during an after-hours gathering at an Annapolis cigar bar last month was published by The Washington Post.

Mary Ann Lisanti, 51, apologized to the Maryland House Democratic Caucus on Tuesday, one day after she apologized to the leaders of the state’s Legislative Black Caucus. In a message to her constituents in Harford County northeast of Baltimore, Lisanti said she was "ashamed" and "sickened" she had used the word, which "does not represent my belief system, my life’s work or what’s in my heart."

It is my hope and prayer that you … can forgive me for the pain that I have caused, and help me to mend what I have broken," she added. "I will continue work every day to repent for my actions and represent my constituents."

The Post reported on Monday that Lisanti told a white colleague that he had been campaigning in a "[N-word] district" in mostly black Prince George’s County to support a candidate in last fall’s elections. Asked about it by the newspaper earlier this month, The Post reported that Lisanti said, "I don’t recall that. … I don’t recall much of that evening."

When asked by The Post whether she had ever used the slur, the newspaper reported that she said: "I’m sure I have. … I’m sure everyone has used it."

Del. Darryl Barnes, the Legislative Black Caucus of Maryland chairman, described Lisanti’s apology as "woefully inadequate" and urged House Speaker Michael Busch to discipline the delegate. Busch, also a Democrat, announced Lisanti would no longer chair the Unemployment Insurance Subcommittee of the House Economic Matters Committee, because "I believe that leaders in the House need to be able to bring people together — not tear them apart."

"I hope that through sensitivity training that Delegate Lisanti has agreed to and the help of her colleagues, she will develop a greater understanding of the impact that she has had on her fellow legislators and the entire House of Delegates," Busch said in a statement.

Barnes, who represents part of Prince George’s County, noted in his letter to Busch that African-Americans make up nearly 30 percent of Maryland’s population. He also pointed out that the Maryland General Assembly has 57 black members out of 188 legislators.

"It is clear that Delegate Lisanti is unsuited to continue in a position of leadership in the Maryland General Assembly," Barnes said in the letter. "We have been receiving calls for her resignation, removal of subcommittee chairmanship, and to be censured on the House floor."

In neighboring Virginia, the state government has been embroiled in scandal since Gov. Ralph Northam and Attorney General Mark Herring, both Democrats, acknowledged they wore blackface in the 1980s. They both resisted calls to resign.

A group of House Republicans gathered Tuesday on Capitol Hill to express their anger over two bills proposed by their Democratic colleagues that, if passed, would drastically tighten federal gun laws.

The Republican lawmakers, who were joined by a group of Second Amendment supporters, lambasted the two bills – HR 8 and HR 1112 – as “ineffective” and far overreaching measures that would ultimately lead to guns being confiscated from lawful owners.

“This bill turns law abiding citizens into criminals and it’s one more step towards federalized gun registration and ultimately gun confiscation,” Rep. Steve Scalise, R-Ga., the House Minority Whip, said. “That’s been the intention of many of the people bringing this bill for a long time. They want true gun control and this is the first step and surely not the last.”

Scalise became a victim of gun violence when he was severely wounded by a gunman who opened fire while lawmakers were practicing for the annual Congressional Baseball Game for Charity in June 2017.

HR 8, which was approved by the House Judiciary Committee earlier this month in a 23-15 vote along party lines, would expand the scope of federal background checks and require nearly all purchasers of firearms to undergo a background check – even if they were bought it at a gun show, online or in a private transaction. HR 1112, which passed the committee 21-14, would require gun dealers to wait 10 days to receive answers about a background check.

The bills were introduced a day before the one-year anniversary of the mass shooting that killed 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.

“Although we know the issue of gun violence won’t be fixed overnight, there are steps Congress can and must take to address it,” Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., the chair of the House Judiciary Committee, said in a statement. “Closing loopholes in the current background check system are long-overdue legislative measures that will help address this national crisis.”

While a handful of House Republicans have signed up in support of HR 8 – including Rep. Peter King of New York – the vast majority of GOP lawmakers opposed the legislation.

“Frankly HR-8 is taking the fears and concerns of a nation over gun violence and perpetrating a fraud upon the,” Rep. Doug Collins, R-Ga., said on Tuesday. “They are preying upon the very victims they are supposedly trying to help by putting a bill out there that will not help them. By constantly bringing up the mass violence instances such as schools and theaters and others. They are saying this will help.The reality is nothing in this bill would have stopped Parkland and nothing in this bill would have stopped the violence we have seen.”

The bills are part of the Democrats’ efforts since retaking control of the House to move quickly to combat gun violence and they appear set to pass through the lower house of Congress. The legislation, however, is likely to meet a quick end once it lands in the Republican-controlled Senate.

SENATE NEARS THRESHOLD TO BLOCK TRUMPRaleigh News & Observer: “North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis plans to break with President Donald Trump over his national emergency declaration, which would allow him to go around Congress to secure funds for a southern border wall. Tillis, a Republican, wrote an op-ed in The Washington Post explaining his decision to vote for a resolution of disapproval, rebuking Trump. The Democratic-led U.S House is expected to pass the resolution Tuesday evening, a move that would require the Senate to consider the resolution within three weeks. … ‘As a conservative, I cannot endorse a precedent that I know future left-wing presidents will exploit to advance radical policies that will erode economic and individual freedoms,’ Tills wrote. Tillis, who is up for re-election in 2020, is the third Republican to publicly pronounce his or her intention to vote for the resolution of disapproval. Sen. Susan Collins of Maine and Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska have also indicated they are likely to support the resolution.”

What are other Republicans saying? –WaPo: “Few Republican Senators have released definitive statements on the resolution, but many have made statements on the emergency. … At least six Republican senators, Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), Susan Collins (R-Maine), Mike Lee (R-Utah), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), have expressed opposition to the national emergency since it was declared. All six support more border security but saw the move as executive overreach and potentially unconstitutional. … Republicans are also concerned the national emergency could spawn numerous court battles, which it already has, and a lengthy judicial review. … At least eleven GOP senators, including [Lindsey] Graham and Rick Scott (R-Fla.), early proponents of the national emergency, have expressed support for the declaration, which they described as a necessary use of executive power and which some saw as a fulfillment of Trump’s campaign promise to build a wall.”

Wisconsin Gov. Evers withdraws troops from border – AP: “Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers on Monday ordered the state’s National Guard troops to withdraw from the border with Mexico, drawing the ire of a Republican congressman from Illinois who serves as a pilot in the Wisconsin detachment. Former Republican Gov. Scott Walker ordered troops to Arizona in June to assist with administrative duties along the border. Evers, a Democrat, issued an executive order Monday withdrawing them. Evers announced the order late Monday afternoon. … Adam Kinzinger, a Republican congressman from Illinois, tweeted on Monday that he is a member of the Wisconsin National Guard and criticized Evers for his decision. In a series of tweets, he said he was sent to the border as a member of the Wisconsin National Guard and his crew caught a man crossing the border with 70 pounds of methamphetamine. ‘Wonder the damage that would do in Milwaukee…’ he tweeted.”

THE RULEBOOK: POWER IN CHECK“The power of making treaties is an important one, especially as it relates to war, peace, and commerce; and it should not be delegated but in such a mode, and with such precautions, as will afford the highest security that it will be exercised by men the best qualified for the purpose, and in the manner most conducive to the public good.” – John Jay, Federalist No. 64

TIME OUT: WHAT GOES AROUND COMES AROUND Smithsonian: “Scholars have long known that Charles Dickens was cruel to his wife, Catherine. In their early letters, the novelist addressed her affectionally … but that tone changed dramatically some two decades into their marriage once he met and began an affair with then-18-year-old actress Ellen Ternan. … Catherine’s side of the breakup tale has remained mostly obscured from history until now. Her rarely heard perspective comes back with vengeance thanks to a trove of 98 previously unseen letters that show Charles … was actually gas lighting his wife as they separated. The missives were unearthed by University of York professor John Bowen, who specializes in 19th-century fiction. He first became aware of their existence when he noticed them listed in an auction catalogue from 2014. … The letters were written by Dickens family friend and neighbor Edward Dutton Cook to a fellow journalist, and they include details about the couple’s separation, which Catherine shared with Cook in 1879, the year she died.”

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HARRIS WON’T RUN, GOP NEEDS CANDIDATEPolitico: “Republican Mark Harris announced on Tuesday that he will not run in the new election for North Carolina’s 9th Congressional District, citing his compromised health. A new election was called last week after Harris’ campaign was the subject of fraud allegations that tainted the midterm election. The state board of elections declined to certify the race between Harris and Democrat Dan McCready in 2018, instead voting last week to order a new election. ‘Given my health situation, the need to regain full strength, and the timing of this surgery the last week of March, I have decided not to file in the new election for Congressional District 9,’ Harris said in a statement. ‘It is my hope that in the upcoming primary, a solid conservative leader will emerge to articulate the critical issues that face our nation.’ Harris said he will support Stony Rushing, a Union County commissioner, in the Republican primary for the district.”

N.C. special election draws attention to 2020 –Roll Call: “What may be the most high-profile special election of 2019 is likely to attract national attention as a harbinger of things to come in a competitive state next year. … In a nationalized political environment, the outcome would contribute to the narrative about North Carolina heading into 2020, when GOP Sen. Thom Tillis is up for his first re-election. Inside Elections rates the Senate race Tilts Republican. The demographically shifting state is also a must-win for Trump, who carried it by less than 4 points in 2016. Republicans fear a divisive and messy 9th District primary in a high-profile special election could jeopardize the seat and complicate their efforts in other federal races next year. … Democrats have the advantage of time and money. McCready has been consistently fundraising — raising more than $500,000 by the end of 2018 — well before the new election was called for.”

2020 EARLY-STATE DEM ACTIVIST TEMPERATURE CHECKFive Thirty Eight: “[Political scientist Seth Masket] reached out to the 60 activists twice recently… Each time, [he] heard back from roughly 35 of the activists. Of those, only nine said they had committed to a candidate… That level of indecision doesn’t seem all that unusual given the size of the field. Most modern presidential nomination contests have an obvious front-runner, but when they don’t (as was the case with the Democratic field in 1988), activists may take their time choosing a candidate. Several … suggested that they may wait until the summer or fall of 2019 [or wait until they] meet with the candidates before making up their minds. … Overall, in February, there were five candidates — [Kamala Harris], [Cory Booker], Sherrod Brown, Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar — who were being considered or had been committed to by more than 35 percent of these activists. It is notable to see Brown’s and Klobuchar’s names included in this group, since at the beginning of February, each had received little national media attention and neither had gained much traction in the polls.”

Klobuchar, Harris approach Iowa with same goal but different reasons – Atlantic: “Demographically and economically, Iowa isn’t actually that representative… Enter two candidates … who both see the state as crucial… Amy Klobuchar and Kamala Harris need the same thing, but they need it for opposite reasons. … For Klobuchar, Iowa is her neighbor to the south… A win in the Iowa caucuses could validate her pitch that the 2020 election is calling out for someone who can link the years her grandfather spent working in a mine to the ‘grit’ to stand in a snowstorm for her own campaign announcement two weeks ago, and connect a purported hard-nosed pragmatism to years of big wins in her home state. … But the state is key for [Harris] too: She wants a top finish here next February that would solidify her as a front-runner and give her the momentum going into a four-week blitz around the country…”

Biden team ‘collecting resumes’ ahead of final decision – Fox News: “A decision by former Vice President Joe Biden on running for the White House could still be more than a month away, but that’s not stopping members of his team from taking the initial steps to build a campaign structure. ‘They’re collecting resumes but making no commitments,’ a source close to Biden’s inner circle told Fox News on Tuesday. ‘They’re thinking about where people fit’ into a possible presidential campaign. The source asked to remain anonymous to speak more freely. … ‘We know we’ll lose people,’ the source acknowledged, with regard to the time Biden is taking to reach a decision. But those concerns don’t appear to weigh too heavily on the former vice president when it comes to his timetable.”

Sanders believes he can win in ‘Trump Country’ – Politico: “Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) at times Monday sounded like he was already running against President Trump in a general election, rather than the crowded field of Democrats he must first do battle with in the 2020 primary. During a televised town hall on CNN, Sanders criticized Trump for abandoning working Americans, promised to campaign in ‘Trump Country,’ and even gave a nod to a county in Pennsylvania that voted for Trump after backing Barack Obama twice. … Sanders also attempted to reach out to voters of color, speaking at length about racial disparities, including the wealth gap between black and white Americans. Sanders said he believes he can defeat Trump in Florida, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan, four swing states that were key to the president’s victory in 2016.”

Sanders will release his tax returns –National Journal: “Sen. Bernie Sanders is preparing to release his tax returns, sources with knowledge of his plans told National Journal. The display of personal financial transparency goes well beyond what the Vermont independent did during his 2016 presidential bid, when he failed to produce a comprehensive look at prior returns. One source familiar with the campaign’s internal discussions suggested that 10 years of filings would be released. The Sanders campaign did not respond to detailed questions about his plan by press time. Sanders brought in roughly $1.75 million in book royalties across 2016 and 2017, on top of his $174,000 Senate salary. But he still ranks among the least wealthy senators, according to the most recent public data.”

Gillibrand defends Green New Deal, big-money fundraisers –Fox News: “Presumptive Democratic presidential candidate Kirsten Gillibrand compared the Green New Deal to NASA’s race for the Moon in the 1960s, telling Fox News’ ‘Special Report’ Monday night that ‘global climate change … is the greatest threat to humanity we have.’ … Gillibrand and [Chris Wallace] then had a lively exchange over Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s vow to not hold any ‘big-money fundraisers’ during her campaign. Wallace asked Gillibrand if she saw any contradiction between Warren’s promise and Gillibrand’s plans to hold a March fundraiser at the home of Pfizer executive Sally Susman. … ‘Of course, I’m going to ask Americans all across this country to support my campaign,’ Gillibrand said.”

IT’S ELECTION DAY IN CHICAGOUSA Today: “Voters head to the polls Tuesday to pick a new mayor to take on the challenges weighing down the nation’s third-largest city: Billions of dollars in unmet pension obligations, endemic corruption and persistent gun violence. A record 14 candidates are on the ballot. Most of the candidates announced they were running after two-term Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced in September that he wouldn’t seek a third term. The field includes eight people of color and ten who have never held elected office. … Under Chicago’s election rules, if no candidate wins more than 50 percent of the vote, the top two vote-getters will face off in an April 2 runoff. No candidate is polling at more than 14 percent, according to a survey published Sunday by 270 Strategies.”

AUDIBLE: ‘DON’T LOOK BACK’“I can remember college, you take a test and people gather around to talk about the test. I was never part of that gathering because there was not a damn thing I could do about what I’d written, so I didn’t do that. I took the test; that’s all I could do. Don’t look back.” – Former Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid in a wide-ranging interview with CNN discussing his legacy, the Bush era and other topics.

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YOU’RE DOING IT WRONGWSBTV: “A Florida man stole more than $30,000 in rare coins and cashed them in for a fraction of their value at change machines at area grocery stores, investigators said. Palm Beach Sheriff’s Office investigators said Shane Anthony Mele, 40, stole the rare presidential coins, valued at $1,000 each, and other items worth a total of $350,000, the Palm Beach Post reports. Investigators said Mele sold some of the coins to a pawn shop for $4,000, then exchanged the majority of them through CoinStar change machines at grocery stores, which would only give face value for them, a fraction of their worth. Mele was arrested and charged with grand theft and unrelated drug charges.”

AND NOW, A WORD FROM CHARLES…“Great leaders are willing to retire unloved and unpopular as the price for great exertion.” – Charles Krauthammer (1950-2018) writing for the Houston Chronicle on Nov. 6, 2004.

“After consulting with my physicians, there are several things that my health situation requires as a result of the extremely serious condition that I faced in mid-January,” Harris said in a statement. “One of those is a necessary surgery that is now scheduled for the last week in March.”

Harris added, “I have decided not to file in the new election for Congressional District 9.”

Last week, Harris, who outpaced Democrat Dan McCready by 905 votes in the contested race, said in court he has suffered two strokes since the election and was “struggling” to get through the hearing.

In his statement Tuesday, Harris threw his support behind Union County Commissioner Stony Rushing.

"The North Carolina Republican Party fully supports Dr. Harris’ decision,” North Carolina Republican Chairman Robin Hayes said. “The most important thing for him to address is his health. This has been a grueling process for all involved, and we unequivocally support his call for a new election.”

Last week, Harris acknowledged a new election should be held after days of testimony in a hearing on ballot-tampering.

“I believe a new election should be called,” Harris said. “It’s become clear to me that public confidence in the 9th District has been undermined to an extent that a new election is warranted.”

In his sworn testimony, Harris said that he was assured by political operative – and convicted felon – Leslie McCrae Dowless that campaign workers would never collect absentee ballots, despite concerns from Harris’ son, John, that Dowless was illegally collecting and turning in ballots from voters.

One of the methods participants said Dowless used was to hire workers to collect absentee ballots from voters who received them, and then turn them over to him, according to an elections board investigation.

State election law prohibits anyone other than a guardian or close family member from handling mail-in ballots. Harris’ team initially said in a legal briefing submitted to the elections board last week the board should certify him the winner — no matter what Dowless did for the campaign.

Harris’ comments calling for a new election came a day after his son took the stand in emotional testimony that left his father in tears.

"I raised red flags at the time the decision was made to hire Mr. Dowless," John Harris said in his testimony on Wednesday.

Fox News’ David Lewkowict and Andrew O’Reilly and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Bernie Sanders’ Democratic presidential campaign is experiencing a major shakeup, with several top advisers heading for the exits, just one week after the Vermont senator launched his second bid for the White House.

Three of the top advisers who helped propel the senator’s 2016 White House bid — Tad Devine, Julian Mulvey, and Mark Longabaugh — are parting ways with Sanders, the campaign confirmed Tuesday.

Sanders 2020 campaign manager Faiz Shakir said in a statement to Fox News that "the campaign appreciates all the good work DML has done and wishes them well." DML is the name of the political consulting firm headed up by Devine, Mulvey and Longabaugh.

"The entire firm has stepped away. We’re leaving the campaign … We just didn’t have a meeting of the minds,” Longabaugh told NBC News, which was first to report the departure of the senior strategists.

Devine, a veteran political strategist who was a top adviser to the presidential campaigns of then-Vice President Al Gore in 2000 and then-Sen. John Kerry in 2004, served as Sanders’ chief strategist and leading surrogate in 2016. Longabaugh steered the campaign’s game plan for winning delegates and negotiating with the Democratic National Committee. Mulvey played a large role in creating the campaign’s television and digital ads.

Sanders, once a longshot for the 2016 Democratic nomination, crushed Hillary Clinton by 22 percentage points in the New Hampshire Democratic primary, launching him into a marathon battle with the eventual nominee that didn’t end until after the primary and caucus calendar concluded.

But this time, Sanders is running in a crowded field with several other liberal Democrats, like Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and California Sen. Kamala Harris, with others expected to join the race.

On Monday, Sanders’ campaign sought to demonstrate the enthusiasm for his campaign by reporting that 1 million people had already signed up to volunteer. As of Monday, six days after his campaign launch, the senator also had raised an eye-popping $10 million from over 359,914 donors. Those numbers put him far ahead of his rivals for the nomination in the race for campaign cash.

But Sanders has also drawn fire from former aides to Clinton, who leaked details about Sanders’ use of private jets in 2016 to attend campaign rallies on her behalf. That provoked Sanders’ 2016 campaign spokesman, Michael Briggs, to tell Politico that Clinton’s staff are the "biggest a–holes in American politics," adding that Clinton is “one of the most disliked politicians in America.”

But the independent from Vermont who last week launched his second straight bid for the Democratic presidential nomination downplayed the public unveiling of his financial details, saying “they’re very boring tax returns.”

Asked during a CNN town hall Monday night why the delay in releasing his returns, Sanders answered “well, you know, the delay is not — it’ll bore — our tax returns will bore you to death. It’s simply — nothing special about them. It just was a mechanical issue. We don’t have accountants at home. My wife does most of it. And we will get that stuff out.”

The populist firebrand and self-described democratic socialist owns two homes in Vermont and one in Washington, D.C. Sanders has also earned more than $1 million annually in recent years, though he remains on the lower end of Senate Democrats in terms of net worth.

Sanders faced some criticism for not releasing his taxes during his marathon 2016 primary battle with eventual Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.

“I didn’t end up doing it because I didn’t win the nomination. If we had won the nomination, we would have done it,” Sanders explained on Monday.

But Clinton made eight years’ worth of tax returns available in July 2015, early in the primary campaign and a year before the general election.

President Trump cast aside decades of tradition during the 2016 presidential campaign when he refused to voluntarily release his tax returns, which could give some transparency to his large real estate and entertainment empire that he touts is worth some $10 billion. Trump said at the time that his taxes couldn’t be released because he was under audit.

Democrats, who now control the House of Representatives, are taking steps to try to compel the president to release his returns. But Trump has repeatedly reiterated that he won’t release his personal tax returns or those for the Trump Organization until a review of the records is completed. And he’s argued that he wouldn’t release them because Americans elected him in 2016 without seeing his returns.

Sanders announced his 2020 presidential bid last Tuesday. As of Monday, six days after his campaign launch, the senator had raised an eye-popping $10 million from over 359,914 donors. Those numbers put him far ahead of his rivals for the nomination in the race for campaign cash.

Speaking about the Russia investigation, Clinton said: “There hasn’t really been that kind of solemn, somber laying of facts and information before the public and the press that should happen in our democracy.

“There is enough grounds in what has already been made public for the government for Congress, in particular, to be doing more with [the Mueller report]. I’m pleased that under Speaker Pelosi, the Democrats are beginning to hold hearings and try to connect some of these dots.”

The former secretary of state also offered up some insight into her campaign, describing it as “kind of Obama 2.0,” and pointed the finger at Trump and the Russians for that campaign ultimately coming up short.

“I mean I obviously had hired a lot of Obama’s people. They were incredibly able, they did a great job, but Trump, the Russians, Cambridge Analytica, all of his assorted allies, were running a campaign in an entirely different arena,” Clinton told Tina Brown.

“I don’t think I or my people understood that, you know, we would see a little pop-up story that some idiot says that Pope Francis endorsed Donald Trump. Who is going to believe that, how ridiculous.”

The interview also turned to the topic of other women trying to go one step further than Hillary and make history as the first female president – including Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Sen. Kamala Harris and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand.

Clinton said all women will face the challenge of having to come off as “likable,” saying it is not as much of a concern for their male opponents.

“How does a woman stand up for herself on the biggest stage in the world without No. 1 looking aggressive, maybe a little bit angry, that somebody is behaving like that, being willing to go toe to toe when there are so few memories embedded in our collective DNA where women do that?

“So yes I’m willing to stand up for what I believe in but that is still kind of scary for some people. So how do you get on this kind of Goldilocks path where you’re not too strong and you’re not too weak, you’re not too aggressive and you’re not too passive?”

BLADENSBURG, Md. — The war memorial has seen better days. Sitting in a traffic circle in the Washington suburbs, the Bladensburg Peace Cross as it is known has large cracks in its tan concrete and pink granite. Water damage has stained the 40-foot structure, covered partially by a tarp to prevent more decay.

But this worn-down, century-old monument is now at the center of a fiery Supreme Court fight – one where the newest justice, Brett Kavanaugh, once again could play a decisive role.

The memorial’s supporters say the structure was erected solely to honor those who died in battle during World War I – and, despite its shape, is secular in nature. Opponents call it an impermissible overlap of church and state, since the Latin cross design sits on public land.

"There is an unfairness of suggesting that a cross could represent all veterans when clearly not all veterans are Christians," said Roy Speckhardt, executive director of the American Humanist Association, which opposes the cross on public land.

Justices Wednesday will hold 70 minutes of oral arguments and hear from both sides over an issue that has divided the courts and the public for decades. It presents another opportunity for consistent, clear markers to be created on when such "passive" religious displays and speech, if ever, can occur the public arena.

Hundreds of similar cross-shaped war memorials across the country, as well as other religious displays, could be affected. Those include permanent Ten Commandments monuments and seasonal Nativity scenes in local parks.

The Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty and the American Jewish Committee are among those backing the memorial’s removal. But 109 members of Congress and 28 states are among those filing briefs in support of the veterans.

“The Supreme Court should honor the way Gold-Star mothers chose to remember the service and sacrifice of their sons who died defending our freedom,” said Kelly Shackelford, president of First Liberty Institute, which is leading the legal fight to preserve the cross. “If this gravestone is bulldozed to the ground, it’s only a matter of time before the wrecking ball turns on Arlington National Cemetery and the hundreds of memorials like this one across the country.”

The Trump administration also will be given argument time before the justices to make its case for the memorial.

Honoring the Fallen

Fundraising for the Peace Cross began soon after the "war to end all wars" concluded. Spearheaded by Gold Star mothers of Prince George’s County, Md., who lost their sons to battle, it honors 49 men, including four African-American soldiers and a Medal of Honor recipient. It was completed in 1925, built by members of local American Legion posts with private donations. It was later rededicated as a memorial to honor all American veterans.

Inscribed at the base of the monument are four words: Valor, Endurance, Courage, and Devotion. There are no written references to God, Christianity, or religion.

Complicating matters, however, a Maryland parks commission in 1961 gained control of the cross and land around the busy intersection. The government now pays for maintenance and upkeep, though veterans groups regularly hold memorial services there. The structure includes the embedded symbol of the American Legion.

Among the names listed is Pvt. Thomas Notley Fenwick, who died of pneumonia in 1918 after being gassed while on the French front. His niece Mary Ann Fenwick Laquay grew up hearing stories about her uncle and regularly visits the memorial.

"I know he’s not buried there but I feel like he is, it’s like going to the cemetery," the 80-year-old said. "It needs to stay right where it is. It’s not hurting anybody … Why are [those opposed] so determined to destroy something that means so much to so many people?"

Similar cross displays on federal land to honor war dead can be found at nearby Arlington National Cemetery. A simple cross dedicated to World War I veterans was located for decades in California’s Mojave National Preserve, but was transferred in 2012 to private hands in a land swap, with the Supreme Court’s blessing.

In Bladensburg, three area residents and the American Humanist Association filed suit in 2014, saying in court papers the memorial sends a "callous message to non-Christians."

"I think it was intended to be a Christian symbol from the beginning," Roy Speckhardt, the group’s executive director, told Fox News. "Unfortunately the cross can’t be a symbol for all. It doesn’t represent our veterans who’ve served honorably who are Muslim, Buddhist, and Jewish. And of course those of no faith at all."

AHA and other groups point out the original contributors to the memorial signed a pledge, stating, "With our motto, ‘One God, one Country and one Flag,’ we contribute to this memorial cross commemorating the memory of those who have not died in vain."

The association has suggested the memorial either be moved to private property or redesigned.

A divided federal appeals court in 2017 agreed, ruling the Bladensburg memorial cross was a "core symbol of Christianity” and concluded "the purported war memorial breaches the wall of separation between Church and State."

"The sectarian elements easily overwhelm the secular ones," Judge Stephanie Thacker wrote for the 2-1 majority.

In lower court arguments, one judge said the dispute could be resolved by replacing the memorial. Another suggested stripping the horizontal arms from the cross, something its supporters liken to desecration.

Faith Fractures

The Supreme Court has a mixed record on disputes concerning religious freedom and the separation of church and state, with the justices often using a case-by-case determination.

The high court has allowed some religious-themed displays on public property, while banning others. In 1971, the court established its three-prong "Lemon" test, named for one of the parties in the case, for the relationship between church and state.

Under those standards, the government can assist a religious interest only if the primary purpose of the assistance is secular, the assistance neither promotes nor inhibits religion, and there is no excessive entanglement between church and state.

But the approach has had its critics. The late Justice Antonin Scalia in 1993 tweaked his colleagues for their "wavering" application of precedent.

"Like some ghoul in a late-night horror movie that repeatedly sits up in its grave and shuffles abroad, after being repeatedly killed and buried, Lemon stalks our Establishment Clause jurisprudence once again," he wrote. "It is there to scare us (and our audience) when we wish it to do so, but we can command it to return to the tomb at will."

Justice Clarence Thomas was more succinct in 2011, saying the court’s jurisprudence on the matter was "anyone’s guess."

Yet a court majority in recent years has sought a more nuanced position, recognizing perhaps how divisive the issue has become. In his narrowly drawn 2018 majority opinion, just weeks before announcing his retirement, Justice Anthony Kennedy was in the 7-2 majority favoring a Colorado baker who refused to create a customized cake for a gay couple’s union, claiming a sincere faith-based exemption to the state’s anti-discrimination law.

With Kennedy now replaced by Kavanaugh on the court, some observers believe the 5-4 conservative majority will be more sympathetic to religious liberty claims. And Kavanaugh could prove the decisive vote in the current fight, where history and context of the Bladensburg memorial are sure to be presented at argument.

‘We can’t back down’

The American Legion’s Colmar Manor Post 131 is less than a mile from the Bladensburg Peace Cross. Nearby are other smaller monuments to those lost from other American conflicts and the 9/11 terror attacks. The group sponsors the annual Memorial Day ceremony of remembrance on the site, and is one of the case litigants.

On a recent Friday, three local Vietnam-era veterans gathered to talk about their service, and support for the Peace Cross.

"The 49 men over there, we don’t know what religion they are," said Stan Shaw. "Because the military never asked them that, when they were over there fighting."

"When I came of age, 13 years old, my father took me by the Peace Cross, and said, ‘Son, this is what the people of this county think of military service,’" said Mike Moore. "Having that memorial torn down, defaced, or bulldozed, I can’t conceive of it. It would be an insult to all those who served."

"We can’t back down, we have got to win this," added Phillip Holdcraft. "We can’t desecrate all these memorials across the United States. They’re not for Christians, they’re for the veterans."

But some Jewish and Muslim veterans groups are among those opposing the memorial’s design, saying it is not inclusive or respectful of their faiths.

"Veterans of all stripes are united by their love of country, but they are not united by the cross," the Jewish War Veterans of the United States of America, Inc., told the high court in a brief. "It does a disservice to both Jewish veterans and Christian veterans to suggest otherwise."

A federal appeals court on Tuesday rejected a challenge to the appointment of Special Counsel Robert Mueller, after a former assistant to Trump political adviser Roger Stone brought the case following his refusal to comply with a grand jury subpoena.

Stone associate Andrew Miller refused to testify before the grand jury as part of the Russia investigation, claiming Mueller was illegitimately appointed as special counsel. Miller claimed that Mueller’s appointment was “unlawful” because he was appointed by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, rather than former Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on Tuesday affirmed the validity of Mueller’s appointment to investigate Russian meddling and potential collusion with Trump campaign associates in the 2016 presidential election.

“Because the Special Counsel is an inferior officer, the Deputy Attorney General became the head of the Department [of Justice] by virtue of becoming the Acting Attorney General as a result of a vacancy created by the disability of the Attorney General [Jeff Sessions] through recusal on the matter, we hold that Miller’s challenge to the appointment of the Special Counsel fails,” the court wrote in its decision. “Accordingly, we affirm the order finding Miller in civil contempt.”

At this point, Miller has the ability to ask the Supreme Court to weigh in on the constitutionality of the special counsel appointment process, which is now overseen by Attorney General William Barr.

Prior to the decision, a lower court also held Miller in contempt. It is unclear whether Miller will now have to appear to testify before the grand jury.

Mueller was appointed on May 17, 2017, by Rosenstein. Rosenstein took oversight of the probe after Sessions recused himself due to his early work on the Trump campaign in 2016.

Mueller’s investigation, which was initially ordered to look into the 2016 election, has gone on for more than a year and a half. It has expanded to probe financial crimes of Trump associates before the election, conversations Trump’s national security adviser had with the Russians during the transition and whether Trump obstructed justice with his comments and actions related to the probe.

Stone was charged with obstruction of justice, witness tampering, and making false statements to Congress after being indicted last month as part of Mueller’s probe.

Twenty-six Russian nationals and three Russian companies have also been charged with interfering in the 2016 presidential election. But none of the Trump associates have been charged with crimes related to collusion.

Other convictions include former national security adviser Michael Flynn and former campaign adviser George Papadopoulos, who both pleaded guilty to making false statements in 2017. Former campaign adviser Rick Gates in 2018 pleaded guilty and former campaign chairman Paul Manafort was convicted and later pleaded guilty in a separate financial crimes case dating back before the 2016 election.

Cohen’s testimony Tuesday before the Senate Intelligence Committee is taking place behind closed doors. On Wednesday, Cohen is testifying before the House Oversight Committee, which will be open. On Thursday, Cohen appears behind closed doors for a House Intelligence Committee interview.

As he entered the hearing room Tuesday, Cohen did not answer questions from reporters about why he should be trusted. As part of a deal with prosecutors, Cohen pleaded guilty to previously lying to Congress about Trump’s past business dealings in Russia, among other crimes.

The White House, in a statement Tuesday, sought to portray Cohen as a liar.

“Disgraced felon Michael Cohen is going to prison for lying to Congress and making other false statements,” White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said. “Sadly, he will go before Congress this week and we can expect more of the same. It’s laughable that anyone would take a convicted liar like Cohen at his word, and pathetic to see him given yet another opportunity to spread his lies.”

Asked by reporters Tuesday what he hopes to hear from Cohen, Senate Intelligence Committee chairman Richard Burr, R-N.C., replied: “Truth.” But Burr added that Cohen has got a questionable track record, when asked if he could believe Cohen or not.

Democrats said ahead of the hearing they want to press Cohen about Trump’s past business endeavors in Russia.

“Because we know that Donald Trump, during his campaign, said ‘I have no interest in Russia’ but that’s yet another one of his total lies,” Senate Judiciary Committee member Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii, said Monday.

Cohen worked for Trump’s business for years before Trump ran for president, serving as the president’s personal lawyer and counselor.

According to a recent memo sent out by committee staff, Cohen’s appearance before the House oversight panel will concern various financial issues related to the 2016 presidential campaign, including payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal that federal prosecutors in New York say were directed by Trump. The hearing will also examine whether Trump has complied with campaign finance and tax laws, his ties to the Trump International Hotel in Washington and "potential and actual conflicts of interest."

A person with knowledge of Cohen’s planned testimony before the House Oversight Committee told the Wall Street Journal that Cohen will publicly accuse Trump of criminal conduct in relation to the hush-money payments.

The Wall Street Journal also reported that Cohen will accuse Trump in his testimony of inflating or deflating his net worth at times to avoid property taxes.

Cohen will not be questioned about the ongoing investigations by Special Counsel Robert Mueller or the House and Senate Intelligence Committees into alleged collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian officials.

Last week, a federal judge approved Cohen’s request to push back the date he is scheduled to report to federal prison by two months. Cohen’s attorneys had pushed for the postponement, saying he had recently undergone shoulder surgery and needed the extra time to complete physical therapy as well as his congressional testimony.

Cohen was originally scheduled to report to jail on March 6 to begin serving a three-year sentence after he pleaded guilty to campaign finance and other violations last year. He is now scheduled to report to jail May 6.

In December, Cohen was sentenced to three years in prison after pleading guilty to campaign finance violations, tax evasion and lying to Congress. He agreed to cooperate with prosecutors as part of a deal.

The charges against Cohen arose from two separate investigations – one by federal prosecutors in New York, and the other by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

Both cases hold potential implications for Trump. Cohen’s admission in the former to breaking the law in making hush-money payments during the 2016 campaign to two women who claimed affairs with Trump has raised questions about whether prosecutors may eventually pursue charges against the president. Cohen said he did so at Trump’s direction.

Speaking in court in December before the judge issued the sentence, Cohen said “blind loyalty” to Trump led him “to take a path of darkness instead of light.”

“They’re collecting resumes but making no commitments,” a source close to Biden’s inner circle told Fox News on Tuesday. “They’re thinking about where people fit” into a possible presidential campaign. The source asked to remain anonymous to speak more freely.

With at least 10 Democrats already in the race – including Sens. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Kamala Harris of California, Cory Booker of New Jersey, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, and Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota – the field for the 2020 Democratic nomination is quickly getting crowded. And at least a half-dozen other likely contenders are expected to make it official in the coming weeks.

Many of the White House hopefuls have already hired experienced staff in the early voting states of Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada. And veteran fundraising bundlers and donors are committing to already-declared Democratic presidential candidates.

“We know we’ll lose people,” the source acknowledged, with regard to the time Biden is taking to reach a decision.

But those concerns don’t appear to weigh too heavily on the former vice president when it comes to his timetable.

“If he loses one more organizer or state chair, he’s not going to let himself get pushed him,” the source added.

As he mulls making a third bid for the White House, Biden’s indicated he’s in no rush.

Speaking overseas at the Munich Security Conference earlier this month, the former vice president said, “I think there is a sufficient amount of time to do that. And I think we have a tendency, particularly in the States, to start the whole election process much too early. I think we should be focusing now on what needs to be done to alter some of the policies that are being promoted by the president."

Another person close to Biden – who also asked to remain anonymous to speak more freely – told Fox News that the former vice president is “definitely leaning towards yes.”

But the source emphasized that family concerns remain the top issue for Biden as he makes his decision.

Looking ahead in the calendar, Jill Biden’s book, "Where the Light Enters: Building a Family, Discovering Myself," is scheduled to be published in May. What that may say about her husband’s 2020 timetable and whether Biden would announce a presidential campaign ahead of his wife’s book tour is unclear.

As leading 2020 Dems advocate spending big on the Green New Deal, it turns out most Americans are worried about other issues.

Big-name White House hopefuls have thrown their support behind the pricey proposal aimed at combatting climate change introduced by freshman star Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. and Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass. Critics say it could cost as much as $93 trillion, or approximately $600,000 per household.

Earlier this month, Ocasio-Cortez ramped up the rhetoric in pushing for the Green New Deal, calling it a “life and death” issue in a series of tweets.

“Don’t mess with our future. When it comes to climate, it’s all our lives at stake. The younger you are, the more consequences you’ll see. It’s life and death for us. And we will fight like it,” she tweeted.

On Sunday, 2020 candidate Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., declined to put a price tag on the Green New Deal and "Medicare-for-all," saying "it’s not about a cost," but rather return on investment.

Previously, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., also a 2020 candidate, told supporters she is “committed to the entire framework” of the proposal, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., co-sponsored the guidelines along with Bernie Sanders, and Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., said he is “excited to support” the “bold action on climate change.”

Other Democrat senators who have voiced support for the plan include: Chris Murphy and Richard Blumenthal, of Connecticut; Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley, of Oregon; and Debbie Stabenow, of Michigan.

The unprecedented plan doesn’t come cheap, American Action Forum president Douglas Holtz-Eakin and his co-authors wrote in their study.

"The Green New Deal is clearly very expensive," the study concluded. "Its further expansion of the federal government’s role in some of the most basic decisions of daily life, however, would likely have a more lasting and damaging impact than its enormous price tag."

“We introduced this resolution because the United States is racing towards a fiscal cliff,” Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., who is sponsoring the legislation, said. “Congress is taking few measures to solve this problem, and it is beyond time for our colleagues in both chambers to become serious about balancing the nation’s budget and recognize this issue as a threat to our national security.”

A similar resolution was introduced last year on the House side, but this time sponsors were able to get some support from Senate colleagues. Biggs has been working with Sen. David Perdue, R-Ga. — a vocal advocate for addressing the debt who even has a debt clock in his office — on a similar resolution in the upper chamber.

“The single greatest threat to our national security is our national debt, and it’s time Washington comes to grips with that reality,” Perdue told Fox News. “This month, our national debt topped $22 trillion. This news should have sounded alarms throughout Washington, but bureaucrats and career politicians didn’t even blink an eye.”

The House resolution aims to not only recognize the debt as a national security crisis, but also restore so-called “regular order” to the appropriations process and address the “fiscal crisis,” according to text of the bill provided to Fox News. The bill has 37 original co-sponsors, and Perdue is still looking for co-sponsors in the Senate.

The measure comes as the debt-ceiling deadline looms in Washington once again, though this time the March 1 deadline isn’t sounding alarm bells. The Treasury Department is expected to use available cash on hand to fund the government through the summer, allowing lawmakers to avoid the debt fight this time around, according to analysis from the Bipartisan Policy Center.

“Congress has bought itself quite a bit of breathing room with this most recent suspension,” Shai Akabas, BPC’s director of economic policy, said in a statement earlier this month. “But that doesn’t mean lawmakers should ignore the debt limit until the next critical deadline.”

Republicans, many of whom were elected on fiscal issues and a commitment to addressing the national debt, have been accused of hypocrisy now that a member of their own party is in the White House. Even in their own ranks, members have accused party leadership of abandoning fiscal principles.

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., admonished his fellow members last year over the budget and spending increases. His opposition actually led to a short government shutdown.

“If you were against President Obama’s deficits and now you’re for the Republican deficits isn’t that the very definition of hypocrisy?” Paul said on the Senate floor last year. “Don’t you remember when Republicans howled to high heaven that President Obama was spending us into the gutter, spending us into oblivion?”

Leaders in the national security community have also made their concerns known about the massive debt. Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats listed the debt as a national security concern last year in a hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee.

“This situation is unsustainable as I think we all know and represents a dire threat to our economic and national security,” Coats said.

Whether the new resolutions will bring the debt issue to the political forefront again remains unclear, but sponsors of the resolutions say it is one they remain committed to addressing.

“Ultimately, the debt impacts our ability to fund priorities, like providing our men and women in uniform with the resources they need to protect Americans,” Perdue said. “This debt crisis will only get worse, and if we don’t act now, our country will lose the ability to do the right thing.”

Trump landed in Hanoi hours after Kim arrived by armored train. Officials in Hanoi told The Associated Press that they only had about 10 days to prepare for the summit, but promised airtight security for the two leaders.

But the chaotic preparations included the White House press corps being shifted to a new hotel before Kim arrived. Kim subsequently toured parts of Hanoi, where locals stood behind barriers to catch a glimpse of the leader of the hermit kingdom.

Trump has repeatedly hailed his meeting with Kim in Singapore last June as a success, although there were few concrete outcomes from the summit.

North Korea initially turned over 55 boxes of presumed remains of U.S. soldiers killed in the Korean War as part of the agreement from the summit, although it has not yet followed through with returning additional remains.

North Korea also pledged to work “toward” complete denuclearization, something critics say the communist regime has not adequately honored either.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo this month said that he was hoping for a “substantive step forward” but cautioned that “it may not happen, but I hope that it will.”

"President Trump has also said this is going to take time. There may have to be another summit. We may not get everything done this week," Pompeo said.

Pompeo said he hoped to put a "road map" in place, but would not discuss the possibility of declaring a formal end to the Korean War or pulling some American troops from South Korea, in keeping with his stand against publicly discussing the issue that could arise during the negotiations.

But Fox News is told that the White House, State Department, Defense Department, Treasury Department and Energy Department are concerned about where Special Envoy to North Korea Stephen Biegun is moving with negotiations — and that he is "getting too far over his skis."

One particular concern is that denuclearization, seen by many officials as non-negotiable, has now become a negotiating term. There is a belief among many officials that "we don’t want to make a deal just to make a deal", and that "we don’t want to give away something for nothing."

Fox News’ John Roberts, Lucas Tomlinson, Jennifer Earl and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Marshall told the panel that the “dealmaker” had a “good photo op and a bump in the polls” after the 2018 summit with Kim Jong Un in Singapore, but that “we can’t have that this time around” and predicted that this summit will only be a repeat.

“Dan Coats said, and I agree with him 100 percent, that Kim Jong Un needs to have the WMDs. That is his security blanket,” Marshall said. “Unless we are hard and push on full denuclearization, we are not taking baby steps toward our goal because in a sense, in this regard, Kim Jong Un is holding the cards and we’re not getting anywhere. What kind of a deal do we have? Really nothing and I fear that we will have that again.”

Steve Hilton expressed a bit more optimism, saying that the “process is the purpose” and that the fact that both nations are talking is a “positive result.”

“If any other president, whether Republican or Democrat, had got to this point by first getting China to participate in the pressure campaign and then to really reboot this relationship so that we’re talking rather than being on the brink of a nuclear catastrophe, they’d be hailed as a foreign policy genius,” Hilton argued.

Meanwhile, Stirewalt insisted that “time” was always on the side of the North Koreans and that part of this week’s summit is to entice Kim Jong Un with Vietnam’s thriving economy.

“The president’s promise to Kim is always, ‘C’mon, play ball with me and you’re gonna end up rich, your country’s gonna end up rich, and you’re gonna see quick growth.’ Whether or not that’s a real thing, I don’t know,” Stirewalt told the panel.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a 2020 presidential candidate, vowed on Monday to avoid any traditional political fundraisers with wealthy donors during the Democratic primaries but said she will go back to traditional fundraising during the general election when she’s up against the GOP’s "wealthy-wealthy donors" and "dark money."

Warren, who is reportedly looking to boost her online fundraising, posted on Medium that she intends to be the "best president money can’t buy."

A senior aide for Warren told the publication, "She is an outsider. She is a reformer. She is an anti-corruption candidate, and this is one of many steps she has taken to help cement that in the mind of voters. By not doing the traditional big-dollar finance program, she will have a lot more time than other candidates to focus on organizing in the early states and other priorities."

Warren appeared on MSNBC’s "All in With Chris Hayes" and was asked about the move. She claimed that avoiding these big-ticket events helps the candidate connect with the grassroots voters and build a strong foundation prior to the 2020 general election.

She was questioned about her past that included reaching out to wealthy donors and putting together a sizable war chest of about $12 million. She indicated that the "big money" fundraiser avoidance would only apply to the primaries because Republicans will be "armed to the teeth" during the general election.

Suddenly, it seems, much of the party is championing radical-sounding proposals with cool slogans, gargantuan price tags and little chance of becoming law.

I happen to think this is a major miscalculation, not because I’m taking a stand on this or that policy but because it tees things up for Donald Trump and the GOP to paint them as the party of socialism.

And this progressive branding, which is what it’s becoming, makes life difficult for the more moderate Democrats who led the charge in the 40-seat pickup in the House.

Both parties face this dilemma at the start of the primary process. What excites the base (left or right) can become an albatross during the general, when candidates usually pivot to the center.

But the complicating factor for the Democrats is that their social-media stars, led by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, are also grabbing all sorts of attention, even though they wield little power in Washington.

And make no mistake, we’re talking about policies that were too far left for Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.

Here’s the lead of a Washington Post piece on the "head-snapping list" embraced by the 2020 Democrats: "Tear down the border wall. Pay slavery reparations. Upgrade every building in America. Tax the assets of rich people, and pack the Supreme Court with four new liberal judges."

Kamala Harris, seeking to solidify her African-American base, has come out for slavery reparations, and Elizabeth Warren matched that and said Native Americans should also be included. Most of them are signing onto the Green New Deal. And with a few exceptions like Amy Klobuchar, they love Medicare for All, with Harris saying it should replace all private health insurance plans.

The New York Times finds Democratic lawmakers in conservative districts fending off questions from voters about whether they stand with the "socialism" and "anti-Semitism" they see coming out of the House.

And in a geographical piece on whether the Dems should focus on the Midwest or the Sun Belt, the Times says "there is a growing school of thought that Democrats should not spend so much time, money and psychic energy tailoring their message to a heavily white, rural and blue-collar part of the country when their coalition is increasingly made up of racial minorities and suburbanites." In short, focus on more liberal areas.

They may be taking a leaf from the Trump playbook, using bombastic rhetoric and sweeping promises as an alternative to Clintonian incrementalism. But there’s a price to be paid for that.

I suppose there’s an argument that galvanizing a surge of liberal voters in such states as Arizona and Georgia would be the party’s best bet. But the Democrats lost to Donald Trump in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, and given the vagaries of the Electoral College, I doubt they can win the White House without getting at least two of those states back. Why surrender their claim as the blue-collar party?

While AOC is only 29, she generates so much media attention, positive and negative, that she’s become a definite factor in this national debate.

As Jim Geraghty writes in National Review, "There is ample evidence that Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is over-covered by both the mainstream media and conservative media … But she embodies what a loud section of the online Left wants to see and what a loud section of the online Right loves to denounce and probably fears."

Conservatives don’t need to pick a fight with her on every little issue. AOC recently announced that to pay her staff a good wage, no employee will make less than $52,000 and none more than $80,000 — meaning she’ll probably hire fewer workers and forego the highly paid chief of staff types.

On "Fox & Friends," Pete Hegseth called this "socialism and communism on display." That enabled AOC to fire back that "the GOP is so disconnected from the basic idea that people should be paid enough to live that Fox actually thinks me paying a living wage in my office is ‘communism.’"

Such spats will be quickly forgotten, but unless there’s a course correction, the debate over the Democrats’ image as an increasingly left-wing party will echo for a long time to come.

Russian state TV on Sunday listed potential targets in the U.S. in the event of a nuclear strike. (Rossiya-1)

Russian state TV on Sunday listed potential targets in the U.S. in the event of a nuclear strike and claimed that its new hypersonic missile technology could reach them in less than five minutes.

Reuters called the report “unusual even by the sometimes bellicose standards of Russian state TV.” The targets included the Pentagon and Camp David. The report came days after Russian President Vladimir Putin warned the U.S. against deploying intermediate-range missiles in Europe.

Putin reaffirmed that Russia will not be the first to deploy new intermediate-range missiles in Europe, but warned that it will retaliate if the U.S. puts such missiles on the continent. He said it will not only target the host countries but field new weapons that will target U.S. decision-making centers.

Washington Examiner’s Jerry Dunleavy first noted that representative erased three posts that were considered by some as anti-Semitic. Fox News has confirmed that those tweets have been deleted.

Omar’s Twitter troubles date back to 2012 when she claimed that Israel has “hypnotized the world” regarding the Jewish state’s ongoing conflict with Palestinians.

The Minnesota Democrat then reignited accusations of anti-Semitism when she suggested that the GOP’s support of Israel is bought, saying that its stance is “all about the Benjamins.” She later named AIPAC as a group that pays pro-Israel politicians despite the fact they don’t make financial contributions to campaigns.

"Anti-Semitism is real and I am grateful for Jewish allies and colleagues who are educating me on the painful history of anti-Semitic tropes My intention is never to offend my constituents or Jewish Americans as a whole," Omar stated. "We have to always be willing to step back and think through criticism, just as I expect people to hear me when others attack me for my identity. This is why I unequivocally apologize."

Many in the GOP called Democratic leadership to remove Omar from the House Foreign Affairs Committee. President Donald Trump slammed her “lame” apology and called on her to resign from Congress.

Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign spokesman unloaded on Hillary Clinton and her team on Monday, calling them the "biggest a–holes in American politics," after former members of Clinton’s campaign leaked details this week about Sanders’ use of private jets to attend campaign rallies on her behalf.

Speaking to Politico, the spokesman, Michael Briggs, proceeded to call Clinton’s staff "total ingrates," given that Sanders claims he billed the Clinton-Kaine campaign for private air travel in order to attend events that he otherwise would have needed to skip.

“You can see why she’s one of the most disliked politicians in America," Briggs said, referring to Clinton. "She’s not nice. Her people are not nice. [Sanders] busted his tail to fly all over the country to talk about why it made sense to elect Hillary Clinton and the thanks that [we] get is this kind of petty stupid sniping a couple years after the fact.”

Briggs added: “It doesn’t make me feel good to feel this way but they’re some of the biggest a–holes in American politics."

Several former Clinton staffers, also speaking to Politico, reported that Sanders’ frequent requests for private planes from the campaign became “a running joke in the office" — in part because Sanders is a socialist, and also because he has pushed for the elimination of carbon-generating heavy aircraft in favor of high-speed rail networks. In all, Sanders reportedly billed the Clinton-Kaine campaign approximately $100,000 for air travel.

Some bad blood remains between the Clinton and Sanders camp, according to insiders, in part because of Sanders’ harsh criticisms of Clinton during the 2016 Democratic presidential primary.

Talking to the liberal “Pod Save America” podcast in 2017, Clinton said she "couldn’t believe" that, because of Sanders, she was forced into "basically defending President Obama in a Democratic primary." And in her book, the election retrospective "What Happened," Clinton slammed Sanders’ ideas as unrealistic and decried him for using “innuendo and impugning my character” such that she suffered “lasting damage" into the general election.

Sanders spokesperson Arianna Jones, though, maintained that Sanders put everything he had into helping Clinton once she had secured the Democratic nomination. Jones said it was physically impossible for Sanders to get to all of the Clinton event locations in such a short period of time without chartered flights, especially since the senator was traveling to many smaller markets with limited commercial air travel options.

“That’s why chartered flights were used: to make sure Sen. Sanders could get to as many locations as quickly as possible in the effort to help the Democratic ticket defeat Donald Trump,” Sanders spokeswoman Arianna Jones told Politico. "Sen. Sanders campaigned so aggressively for Secretary Clinton, at such a grueling pace, it became a story unto itself, setting the model for how a former opponent can support a nominee in a general election.”

Jones reported that in the three months prior to the November 2016 election, Sanders supported Clinton by attending 39 rallies in 13 states.

Sanders stunned the Democratic establishment in 2016 with his spirited challenge to Clinton, and his campaign helped lay the groundwork for the leftward lurch that has dominated Democratic politics in the era of President Trump.

Sanders’ campaign said earlier this month that he raised more than $4 million in the 12 hours since announcing his 2020 presidential bid. Previously, the biggest first-day fundraiser in the race had been California Sen. Kamala Harris, who raised $1.5 million in the first 24 hours of her campaign. And this week, Sanders announced he has already signed up a historic 1 million volunteers.

The question now for Sanders is whether he can stand out in a crowded field of Democrats who embrace many of his policy ideas and who are newer to the national political stage — and whether Sanders can survive with the evident lingering resentment from members of the Democratic Party establishment.

This single family house built on 1981 and located in Burlington, Vermont, is listed to Bernard and Jane Sanders. (Google Maps)

"Our campaign is not only about defeating Donald Trump," the 77-year-old self-described democratic socialist said in an email to supporters announcing his srun. "Our campaign is about transforming our country and creating a government based on the principles of economic, social, racial and environmental justice."

As for whether Sanders — who has pushed for the Green New Deal, which would strive to greatly reduce air travel — would be flying commercial for upcoming campaign trips this year, Jones told Politico he "will be flying commercial whenever possible," and that the "campaign will consider the use of charter flights based on a variety of factors, including security requirements, logistics, and media interest in traveling with the senator.”

Also causing headaches for Sanders’ socialist, penny-pinching image: His high-end income and multiple houses. Notably, he owns three houses. In 2016, he bought a $575,000 four-bedroom lake-front home in his home state. This is in addition to a row house in Washington D.C., as well as a house in Burlington, Vermont.

“The Bern will keep his home in Burlington and use the new camp seasonally,” Vermont’s Seven Day’s reported in 2016.

Fox News’ Adam Shaw and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Bloomberg, a self-made and worth about $57 billion, has not yet indicated whether or not he’ll run in the Democratic primary, but there are reports that he’d spend at least $500 million from his fortune to deny Trump a second term.

Trump told Fox Business in October that Democrats would “eat him [Bloomberg] up” in the primaries, but Corey Lewansowski, the former Trump aide, called Bloomberg a serious threat to Trump.

Buffett told CNBC that if "Bloomberg announced tomorrow that he was a candidate, I would say I’m for him. I think he would be a very good president."

The Oracle of Omaha insisted that he voted for both Republicans and Democrats in the past. But said Bloomberg knows how to “run things.”

Bloomberg’s top two priorities appear to be gun control and climate change. Those policies may appeal to the liberal part of the Democratic Party, but he is also considered by many to be a fiscal moderate. Politico reported that Bloomberg said if he’d run, he’d make climate change his top issue.

2020 presidential candidate Bernie Sanders said Monday night that under his progressive “Medicare-for-all” proposal, Americans would not be able to keep existing health insurance coverage from private plans even if they wanted to do so.

The Vermont senator told a CNN town hall that health care should be a “human right” and that the U.S. “shamefully” was the only major country on Earth “not to guarantee health care to all people.” He argued that the only “cost-effective” way to give all Americans health insurance would be with a “Medicare-for-all single-payer program.”

CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer then pointed to statistics showing half of Americans get their health insurance through their employers and that a recent Gallup poll showed that 70 percent of those who get their insurance from their employers like it.

“Will these people be able to keep their health insurance plans, their private plans through their employers, if there’s a ‘Medicare-for-all’ program that you endorse?” Blitzer asked.

“No,” Sanders responded mid-question as he shook his head. “What will change in their plans is the color of their card. So, instead of having a Blue Cross/Blue Shield card, instead of having a United Health Insurance card, they’re gonna have a Medicare card.”

The self-described Democratic socialist elaborated that under his plan, Americans could go to “any” doctor or hospital they wanted and wouldn’t have to pay “any private insurance premiums.” He also said seniors would get “expanded benefits” including dental care, hearing aids and eyeglasses.

“So, if they like their health insurance plan, they won’t be able to keep their health insurance plan?” Blitzer followed.

“Wolf, nobody- listen, the business of ‘liking’ your insurance plan, which by the way, employers change every single year,” Sanders continued, “people like their doctors, they like the hospitals, they like the care they’re getting.”

“But if they wanted additional private health insurance beyond ‘Medicare-for-all,’ would they be able to purchase that kind of health insurance?” the CNN anchor pressed the senator.

Last month, Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., made plenty of headlines during another CNN town hall after the 2020 candidate called to “eliminate” private health insurance while pushing “Medicare-for-all.”

“Well, listen, the idea is that everyone gets access to medical care. And, you don’t have to go through the process of going through an insurance company, having them give you approval, going through the paperwork, all of the delay that may require,” Harris told Jake Tapper. “Who among us has not had that situation, where you got to wait for approval, and the doctor says, ‘Well I don’t know if your insurance company is going to cover this.’ Let’s eliminate all of that. Let’s move on.”

Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein said Monday he was confident Attorney General Bill Barr would make the right decision about how much of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s final report on the FBI investigation into allegations of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian officials should be made public.

"I think Attorney General Barr is going to make the right decision," Rosenstein said during an event at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. "We can trust him to do that. He has a lot of experience with this … I think we can count on him to do the right thing."

Rosenstein pointed out that the Justice Department was required by law to inform Congress if the special counsel "proposes to take an action and is overruled by the attorney general or the acting attorney general," but added that "the special counsel is a subordinate employee who reports to the attorney general or the acting attorney general and who complies with department policies … just like an acting United States Attorney, for example, would need to do."

Rosenstein spoke one day after House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., said he was willing to take the Justice Department to court "if necessary" to obtain the full Mueller report.

"We will obviously subpoena the report," Schiff told ABC News’ "This Week." "We will bring Bob Mueller in to testify before Congress … And in the end, I think the department understands they’re going to have to make this public."

However, Rosenstein — who has overseen much of Mueller’s day-to-day work since the special counsel’s appointment in May 2017 — appeared to strike a different tone on Monday, saying that "there are a lot of reasons not to be transparent about what we do in government."

"Just because the government collects information doesn’t mean that information is accurate and it can be really misleading if you’re overly transparent about information that the government collects," Rosenstein said. "My view is, the Department of Justice is best served when people are confident that we’re going to operate, when we’re investigating American citizens in particular, we’re going to do it with appropriate sensitivity to the rights of uncharged people."

Justice Department legal opinions have argued that a sitting president cannot be indicted, suggesting prosecutors would not be able to pursue charges against President Trump even if they uncover wrongdoing. That could mean investigators do not make public information they collected on Trump, in deference to the Justice Department’s protocol of not disclosing negative information about people it does not have enough evidence to charge or that, for other reasons, it decides against prosecuting.

"The guidance I always gave my prosecutors and the agents I worked with during my tenure on the front lines of law enforcement were, if we aren’t prepared to prove our case beyond a reasonable doubt in court," Rosenstein said, "then we have no business making allegations against American citizens."

In response to Rosenstein, Schiff tweeted Monday that the Justice Department had a "double standard," alluding to documents made public following the investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server, as well as information Republicans demanded last year during inquiries into the early stages of the FBI’s Russia investigation.

"For two years, I sounded the alarm about DOJ’s deviation from just that principle as it turned over hundreds of thousands of pages in closed or ongoing investigations," Schiff wrote. "I warned that DOJ would need to live by this precedent. And it will."

Also Monday, two prominent Republicans on the House Oversight Committee requested that Rosenstein appear before the panel later this week alongside Michael Cohen, the president’s onetime personal attorney. In a letter to Chairman Elijah Cummings, D-Md., Reps. Jim Jordan of Ohio and Mark Meadows of North Carolina said Rosenstein should testify in order to give information "about the [Justice] Department’s views of Cohen’s crimes and conduct."

Jordan and Meadows also said they wanted to question Rosenstein about claims from former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe that Rosenstein suggested secretly recording Trump in the Oval Office and canvassing Cabinet members to invoke the 25th Amendment in order to remove Trump from office. Rosenstein has denied both claims.

Monday’s appearance is expected to be one of Rosenstein’s last as deputy attorney general. He is expected to step down in March and Trump has nominated Deputy Transportation Secretary Jeffrey Rosen to replace him.

When asked about his time as deputy attorney general, Rosenstein acknowledged that it had been "politically challenging," but added that he was "very confident that when we look back in the long run on this era of the Department of Justice, we’ll be proud of the way the Department’s conducted itself and the president will deserve credit for the folks that he appointed to run the department."

Attorneys for Paul Manafort, the convicted former chairman of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, asked a federal judge Monday to sentence the longtime political consultant to a prison term "substantially below the statutory maximum" of 10 years.

In documents filed in federal court in Washington, D.C, attorneys Kevin Downing, Thomas Zehnle and Richard Westling said prosecutors had presented Manafort "as a hardened criminal who ‘brazenly’ violated the law and deserves no mercy." In fact, they argue, Manafort committed "garden-variety" and "esoteric" crimes by illegally lobbying for a pro-Russian politician in Ukraine, "failed to report to the government the source and total amount of income he made from those activities, and he attempted to conceal his actions from the authorities."

The documents also alleged that Special Counsel Robert Mueller prosecuted Manafort because he was "unable to establish that Mr. Manafort engaged in any Russia collusion" and claimed that Manafort had been "widely vilified in a manner that this country has not experienced in decades."

Paul Manafort, President Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman, leaving the Federal District Court after a hearing in Washington in May 2018. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, File)

Manafort pleaded guilty this past September to one count of "conspiracy against the United States" and one count of conspiracy to obstruct justice. He faces up to five years in prison on each count.

The plea came ten days before he was due to go to trial in a Washington federal court on seven counts of foreign lobbying violations and witness tampering.

"Mr. Manafort has been punished substantially, including the forfeiture of most of his assets," the lawyers added. "In light of his age and health concerns, a significant additional period of incarceration will likely amount to a life sentence for a first time offender."

Earlier this month, U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson, who is to decide Manafort’s sentence, ruled that he had violated his plea deal with prosecutors by lying to federal agents about several subjects, including about his interactions with Konstantin Kilimnik, a business associate who the U.S. said had ties to Russian intelligence. Manafort hasn’t been accused of any crimes related to Russian election interference, but court papers have revealed he gave Kilimnik polling data related to the Trump campaign during the 2016 election. A Mueller prosecutor also said that an August 2016 meeting between the two men went to the "heart" of the Russia probe. The meeting involved a discussion of a Ukrainian peace plan, but many other details about it have been redacted in court papers.

In addition to the case in Washington, Manafort faces the possibility of over 19 years in prison in a separate tax and bank fraud case in federal court in Virginia. A jury in that case convicted him of eight felony counts this past August.

2020 presidential candidate Julián Castro doubled down Monday on his support for reparations to descendants of slavery.

In the wide-open field of Democrats, Castro so far is one of three candidates who’ve backed the policy, which the last Democrat in the White House, former President Barack Obama, had opposed. The other two who’ve indicated they support reparations are Sens. Kamala Harris of California and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts.

The former secretary of Housing and Urban Development under President Obama was asked about his stance by MSNBC’s Steve Kornacki, who cited a 2016 Marist poll that showed an overwhelming majority of Americans opposed reparations.

“I wonder if you could just talk a little bit more about what it is you would do as president when it came to that, and if you are worried that it sends a message to that 68 percent of Americans who say that they’re against it, that maybe you are out of the mainstream a little,” Kornacki said to the candidate.

“This is not something that I see through a political lens. I have long believed that this country should resolve its original sin of slavery and that one of the ways we should consider doing that is through reparations for people who are the descendants of slaves,” Castro responded. “It is interesting to me that under our Constitution and otherwise that we compensate people if we take their property. Shouldn’t we compensate people if they were property sanctioned by the state? So, I believe that that is a conversation worth having, and I see that as right and wrong and I don’t see that political or non-political.”

The former San Antonio mayor elaborated that he would, as president, establish a “task force” that would determine how reparations would be paid out, but stressed that a “dark cloud” still hung over the country and that he was not “naïve” about disagreements over the policy.

“I believe that we ought to move forward in the 21st century as one nation with one destiny and that until that issue is resolved, until that original sin is addressed, we may think that we are moving forward as one nation, but I don’t think we ever really will,” Castro added.

Ivanka Trump, President Trump’s daughter and a White House senior adviser, lauded her father’s economy and said the majority of Americans ideologically believe differently than Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., in an interview with Fox News host Steve Hilton.

“You’ve got people who will see that offer from the Democrats, from the progressive Democrats, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez: ‘Here’s the Green New Deal, here’s the guarantee of a job,’ and think, ‘yeah, that’s what I want, it’s that simple.’ What do you say to those people?” Hilton asked Ivanka Trump in the interview set to air in full on Sunday.

“I don’t think most Americans, in their heart, want to be given something. I’ve spent a lot of time traveling around this country over the last 4 years. People want to work for what they get,” Trump told Hilton. “So, I think that this idea of a guaranteed minimum is not something most people want. They want the ability to be able to secure a job. They want the ability to live in a country where’s there’s the potential for upward mobility.”

Hilton also asked the first daughter about the 2020 election and the idea that it would be framed as a battle between President Trump’s capitalism versus the Democratic party’s perceived tendencies toward socialism.

“I think fundamentally if you ask yourself the question, ‘are we better today than we were yesterday or we were 2 years ago?’ The answer is, undoubtedly, yes,” Trump told Hilton. “So, as an American, families sitting down and thinking about their financial situation relative to a month ago or a year ago, America is doing very well and it stands in quite sharp contrast to the rest of the world. So, not only are we doing well, much of the world has slowed down in terms of the pace of their growth.”

Trump, supporting her father’s workforce development initiative, also said the president’s policies were “continuing to allow this economy to thrive.”

Presumptive Democratic presidential candidate Kirsten Gillibrand compared the Green New Deal to NASA’s race for the Moon in the 1960s, telling Fox News’ "Special Report" Monday night that "global climate change … is the greatest threat to humanity we have."

"Scientists have just reached the conclusion that [climate change is] happening far quicker than we know," the fired-up senator from New York told Chris Wallace. "And, what New Yorkers know and what people all across this country know is, when severe weather hits, people die. It destroys communities."

The Green New Deal, championed by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and endorsed by several of Gillibrand’s would-be competitors in the Democratic field, is an ambitious jobs and infrastructure program that calls for every building in the United States to be replaced or retrofitted to become more energy efficient and for the replacement of air travel with high-speed rail, among other conditions. Republicans have mocked the proposal, saying it would cost trillions of dollars and cripple the U.S. economy.

"When John F. Kennedy was president, he said, let’s put a man on the Moon in the next 10 years, not because it’s easy but because it’s hard," Gillibrand said. "It will be a measure of our innovation, our entrepreneurialism, our excellence. Why not say to the American people, ‘Global climate change is not only real, but the urgency of this moment requires a call to action to all of America’s engineers, all of our entrepreneurs, all of our innovators to … solve the problems together?’"

Gillibrand and Wallace then had a lively exchange over Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s vow to not hold any "big-money fundraisers" during her campaign. Wallace asked Gillibrand if she saw any contradiction between Warren’s promise and Gillibrand’s plans to hold a March fundraiser at the home of Pfizer executive Sally Susman.

"I think you do need to get money out of politics," Gillibrand said. "… Today, the wealthiest, most powerful lobbyists and special interest groups get to write bills in the dead of night."

"Okay, but answer my one question directly," Wallace interrupted.

"I will, but –" Gillibrand began.

"$2,700," said Wallace, referring to the reported top ticket price for the fundraiser.

"Let me finish, let me finish," Gillibrand said. "I got you, I got you, I got your point, I’m going to get to it." The senator went on to describe Susman as "who’s a dear friend who I’ve known for years and years, who believes in my gay-rights platform and believes in women’s rights."

"Okay, but what about $2,700 tickets?" Wallace asked again.

"Let me finish," Gillibrand said again. "So, what’s wrong with Washington is, there’s so much corruption. So much corruption, so much greed. We can’t actually pass common sense gun reform in this country not because the American people aren’t behind it – because they are – but because the (National Rifle Association) is more worried about gun sales than they are about the well-being of our kids. So what’s really wrong with Washington is corruption and greed."

"Can you answer my question," Wallace repeated.

"Yes, just let me finish," said Gillibrand, who went on to claim she would not take money from federal lobbyists, super-PACs or corporate PACs and would not have an individual super-PAC for her campaign.

"Could you just answer, though," Wallace responded. "$2,700 tickets, are you going to go ahead and have the fundraiser or not?"

"Of course, I’m going to ask Americans all across this country to support my campaign," Gillibrand said.

The sweeping "Green New Deal" proposed by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., could cost as much as $93 trillion, or approximately $600,000 per household, according to a new study co-authored by the former director of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.

The sobering and staggering cost estimate came as Democratic presidential hopeful Kamala Harris pointedly declined in an interview broadcast Sunday to put a price tag on the Green New Deal and "Medicare-for-all," saying "it’s not about a cost," but rather return on investment. The Green New Deal’s botched rollout included the release of an official document by Ocasio-Cortez’s office that promised economic security even for those "unwilling to work," and called for the elimination of "farting cows" and air travel.

The unprecedented plan doesn’t come cheap, American Action Forum president Douglas Holtz-Eakin and his co-authors wrote in the study.

"The Green New Deal is clearly very expensive," the study concluded. "Its further expansion of the federal government’s role in some of the most basic decisions of daily life, however, would likely have a more lasting and damaging impact than its enormous price tag."

At the same time, "the breadth of its proposals makes it daunting to assess the GND (Green New Deal) using the standard tools of policy analysis," the study stated, noting that "many of the policies proposed in the GND are redundant with other aspects in it, which also complicates a precise analysis, as the interactions are difficult to predict."

Nevertheless, Holtz-Eakin, who previously served as an economic adviser to John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign, assessed that the resolution’s sweeping jobs guarantee would likely run somewhere between $6.8 trillion to $44.6 trillion, or approximately $49,000 to $322,000 per household.

Universal health care would tally roughly $36 trillion, according to the study. That aligns with other figures: According to the nonpartisan Mercatus Center at George Washington University, for example, Ocasio-Cortez’s plan for universal Medicare would end up costing more than $30 trillion, even after factoring in the sweeping tax hikes that would offset the expense by only about $2 trillion.

Charles Blahous, a senior strategist at the Mercatus Center and an author of its study, later charged that Ocasio-Cortez had wildly misinterpreted his findings to try to argue that "Medicare-for-all" would save money.

Throwing in the more clearly environmentally-focused Green New Deal initiatives, Holtz-Eakin determined, would drive costs even higher.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., speaking in the New York City borough of the Bronx borough earlier this month. (AP Photo/Kevin Hagen, File)

The cost of a 10-year transition to an exclusively low-carbon electricity grid: $5.4 trillion. Net-zero emissions from the transportation network, to the point that air travel is no longer a necessity: from $1.3 to $2.7 trillion. Guaranteed green housing, including potential building renovations: $1.6 to $4.2 trillion. Food security for every living person in the U.S.: $1.5 billion.

The study acknowledged that some double-counting may have occurred, due to apparent flaws in the Green New Deal resolution introduced by Ocasio-Cortez in Congress earlier this month.

"A costly retrofitting of every structure in the United States seems considerably less environmentally beneficial once the electricity grid is completely transformed to use 100 percent clean energy than it would be if undertaken with today’s energy mix," the study stated. "Such a retrofit would have no impact on emissions. Similarly, the GND promises to ensure that every person has a guaranteed job, a family-sustaining rate of pay, and benefits such as paid leave and paid vacations. If everyone has good pay with good benefits, why is it simultaneously necessary to provide targeted programs for food, housing, and health care?"

In her remarks Sunday, Harris suggested that the return on investment from the Green New Deal would make the project worthwhile, despite a high initial cost.

"One of the things that I admire and respect is, the measurement that is captured in three letters: ROI," Harris told CNN’s John King. "What’s the return on investment? People in the private sector understand this really well. It’s not about a cost. It’s about an investment. And then the question should be, is it worth the cost in terms of the investment potential? Are we going to get back more than we put in?"

But, the study found that total savings would pale in comparison to the prohibitive price tag of the sweeping proposal.

Cows have been targeted for potential elimination in the Green New Deal. (iStock, File)

"The GND envisions enough high-speed rail to make air travel unnecessary. We conclude that the rail itself would cost between $1.1 and $2.5 trillion," the study stated. "As a matter of perspective, total 2017 revenue in the airline industry was $175.3 billion, with expenses of $153.9 billion. Fuel expenses were $26.3 billion. It would take decades to pay off the capital investment required for [high-speed rail], and the fuel savings that would presumably be the most important cost difference would only be a fraction of the total investment required."

Separately, on energy, the study found that electricity costs, optimistically, could be expected to increase by 22 percent and that "with an average monthly electric bill in 2017 of $111, the average household could expect around $295 of increased annual expenditures on electricity."

"Total retail revenue in the electric power sector was $390 billion in 2017," the study found. "Generation costs were 59 percent of that, and would go from $230 billion to $387 billion each year in the above scenario, about a $157 billion difference, though if $70.5 billion of annual fuel costs are avoided by 2029 the net annual difference falls to $86.5 billion. That increase (accounting for avoided fuel costs) would drive up total electricity costs by 22 percent."

On Friday, a group of children visiting California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s office suggested that cuts to "the military" could pay for the Green New Deal, after Feinstein said that it was impossible to afford the planned legislation as-is. The fiscal-year 2019 budget for the military includes under $700 billion in appropriations — far less than the $93 trillion estimate from the American Action Forum.

On Monday, protesters from the same group that organized the children’s trip — the Sunrise Movement — flooded the office of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and several reportedly were arrested. Democrats recently have complained that McConnell was "rushing" a vote on the Green New Deal resolution.

Meanwhile, the White House has shown signs it’s angling for socialism to become the defining issue in the 2020 debate amid Democrats’ evolving vows for higher minimum wages and a new array of costly, universal benefits. Even some labor leaders — who represent typically Democrat-leaning rank-and-file constituents – have pushed back in recent weeks against the Green New Deal, saying its call for a total economic transformation could lead to widespread poverty.

On the roster: Dems need more DiFi, less AOC - Dem debate over Rust Belt vs. Sun Belt intensifies - GOP donors worry about Trump’s 2020 strategy - House to pressure senate GOP on Trump emergency - Where are we going? Off campus

DEMS NEED MORE DIFI, LESS AOCWhen she was first elected to the Senate from California a generation ago, Dianne Feinstein was one of the faces of the new “third way” Democratic Party: A social liberal who was also an economic moderate and tough on national security issues.

It took almost two decades for Democrats to recover from their 1968 hangover. But a new generation of leaders like Feinstein would not be so easily pigeonholed by Republicans as radical peacenik socialists who favored big government over economic growth.

On Friday, Feinstein found herself face to face with the next big thing in Democratic politics: Pressure mobs demanding urgent action to institute big government programs at the cost of economic growth.

Oh…

If you didn’t see it during the initial social media splurp, you should certainly watch it. An environmentalist group brought schoolchildren to Feinstein’s office where they hectored the 85-year-old senator for not having signed on to the Green New Deal.

As she’s patiently engaging with the lower-school students, explaining that she has her own environmental policy preferences not drafted by a freshman congresswoman from New York, a high schooler piped up to interrupt Feinstein to tell her that there’s no time to wait.

“You know what’s interesting about this group?” Feinstein said. “I’ve been doing this for 30 years. I know what I’m doing.”

Writer Caitlin Flanagan summed it up beautifully: “The resulting encounter was so gonzo that it made Gran Torino look like The Pajama Game. At the 13th hour of a long career, Feinstein did something that the kids weren’t expecting. She took them seriously, and she patiently explained some truths about American political life that they didn’t understand. And then she did the one thing that an old woman isn’t supposed to do. She said that she wasn’t good at her job in spite of being old, but because of it.”

Liberal activists were outraged that Feinstein would dare contradict the claims of the children, who, as we know, are the future. The plan was asymmetric political warfare: Catch a politician in front of a basket of adorables, pull out the iPhones and make them squirm.

But Feinstein refused to engage on their terms. She acted like adults formerly did, which is to expect that children speak to their elders with due deference and respect. You do not shout at ladies and gentlemen old enough to be your grandparents, certainly not when they are speaking to you respectfully and courteously.

(Just a word here for activists – liberal, conservative or any other flavor – who press fifth graders into duty as political props: Don’t.)

While Feinstein was puncturing the pieties of the Green New Deal in San Francisco, her fellow moderates elsewhere in America were getting punctured themselves.

The NYT accompanied some of the new moderate Democrats in this year’s House freshman class as they held town halls back home. There, it was not the children of environmental activists but rather conservative constituents of their traditionally Republican districts.

“Last week, home for the first district workweek of their term, moderate Democrats got to see firsthand how the raised voices of a small but vocal number of lawmakers such as Representatives [Rashida Tlaib], Ilhan Omar of Minnesota and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York are reverberating in far more marginal districts. Some, like Representative Andy Kim of New Jersey, were asked to account for the ‘uptick of negative rhetoric’ coming from the freshman class.”

Democrats’ new House majority doesn’t rely on reliable districts like those represented by Tlaib, Omar and Ocasio-Cortez but rather those districts that Hillary Clinton either lost or won narrowly in 2016. And yet, it’s the old-school Democrats from old-school Democratic districts who are grabbing all the attention.

As freshman Rep. Ben McAdams, D-Utah, was asked: “How long do you intend to ride that train with those people?”

Voters seem to be wondering the same thing.

A new survey from Public Opinion Strategies, the Cadillac brand of Republican pollsters, gives the GOP some cause for optimism. The poll found Democrats up in the generic congressional ballot by just 2 points overall and trailing by 7 points among suburban voters. That sounds like a good way to give back the House.

It’s just one poll from one Republican polling firm, but it’s yet another sign that a lot of Democrats are taking the wrong lessons from 2018.

If they want to win in 2020, they’ll need more DiFi and less AOC.

THE RULEBOOK: BE WARNED “The causes of hostility among nations are innumerable. … Of this description are the love of power or the desire of pre-eminence and dominion – the jealousy of power, or the desire of equality and safety.” – Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 6

TIME OUT: LUMIÉRES, CAMÉRA, ACTION!NatGeo: “Auguste and Louis Lumière invented a camera that could record, develop, and project film, but they regarded their creation as little more than a curious novelty. Shortly after the public premiere of their film, Louis was said to have remarked: ‘Le cinéma est une invention sans avenir—Cinema is an invention with­out a future.’ This prediction was the Lumières only scientific miscalculation, for this sibling pair created an unprecedented form of art and entertainment that radically influenced popular culture. Their Cinémato­graphe introduced a crucial innovation: By projecting moving images onto a large screen, it created a new, shared experience of cinema. … The Lumières held the world’s first public movie screening on December 28, 1895, at the Grand Café in Paris. Their directorial debut was La sortie des ouvriers de l’usine Lumière (Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory). While today this pre­miere would be considered rather prosa­ic viewing … the clarity and realism of the black-­and-­white, 50-­second film created a sensation.”

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DEM DEBATE OVER RUST BELT VS. SUN BELT INTENSIFIES NYT: “As the Democratic race takes flight, with one or more candidates entering the race almost every week … one side of a long-simmering debate within the party [remains]: Should Democrats redouble their efforts to win back the industrial heartland … or turn their attention to more demographically promising Sun Belt states… The numerical swap between the three Rust Belt states that handed Mr. Trump the White House and the most alluring trio of Sun Belt targets is nearly even: Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin have a combined 46 electoral votes, while North Carolina, Georgia and Arizona offer 42. … The dispute is not merely a tactical one — it goes to the heart of how Democrats envision themselves becoming a majority party. The question is whether that is accomplished through a focus on kitchen-table topics like health care and jobs, aimed at winning moderates and disaffected Trump voters, or by unapologetically elevating matters of race and identity, such as immigration, to mobilize young people and minorities with new fervor.”

Silicon Valley <3’s Cory Booker, and that could be a problem - Recode: “If any Democratic presidential candidate has tapped into the Silicon Valley zeitgeist over their careers, it is Cory Booker. And in 2019, that could be as much a political liability as it is a financial asset. Although the presidential candidate has collected half a million dollars from the internet industry over his five years in the Senate, he found himself traipsing into a very different fundraising environment when he arrived in Silicon Valley over the weekend. Silicon Valley is itself a minefield that in some ways sums up the broader political challenge for Booker in 2020: He’s running as a liberal on issues including tech regulation, but the progressive left holds him in suspicion — and he could face more as he begins to court tech money more openly. As one political activist put it: ‘He’s going to run into problems as the public becomes more aware that he’s in bed with our generation’s Big Tobacco.’”

Warren swears off ‘big money’ fundraisers with wealthy donors - Fox News: “Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren on Monday promised not to hold any political fundraisers with wealthy donors as she runs for the White House, saying she will instead depend on small-dollar contributions to fund her campaign. ‘That means no fancy receptions or big money fundraisers only with people who can write the big checks,’ Warren wrote in a post titled ‘The best president money can’t buy,’ on Medium on Monday. … ‘I’ve already said that I will run my campaign differently—no Washington lobbyist money, no PAC money, no auditioning billionaires to run a super PAC for me, and no dark-money groups devoted to supporting my campaign.’ Warren said that when she thanks people for donating to her campaign, it will not be ‘based on the size’ of their donation. She also said she would rely on small-dollar contributions and grassroots donations and volunteers.”

Bernie and the jets - Politico: “In his campaign launch video last week, Bernie Sanders singled out the fossil fuel industry for criticism, listing it among the special interests he planned to take on. But in the final months of the 2016 campaign, Sanders repeatedly requested and received the use of a carbon-spewing private jet for himself and his traveling staff when he served as a surrogate campaigner for Hillary Clinton. In the two years following the presidential election, Sanders continued his frequent private jet travel, spending at least $342,000 on the flights. Increased scrutiny of his travel practices, which are at odds with his positions on wealth inequality and climate change, are among the challenges Sanders will face as he makes his second White House run.”

Sanders campaign claims 1 million volunteers - Fox News: “Just six days after launching his 2020 presidential bid, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders is celebrating a ‘historic threshold,’ claiming 1 million people have signed up to lend a hand to his White House campaign. ‘Less than one week after we began, we now have one million volunteers in every congressional district in this country who are prepared to roll up their sleeves and get to work to make sure we win the Democratic nomination, that we defeat Trump, and that we transform the economic and political life of our country,’ Sanders said in a video posted to his 9 million followers on Twitter. … Sanders added, ‘So let me thank the one million people who have already signed on and let me ask those of you who haven’t, come on board.’”

In Iowa stop, Hickenlooper throws shade at senators –Denver Post: “In John Hickenlooper’s first joint appearance with candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination, Colorado’s former governor sought to contrast his real-world record with the rhetoric coming from a field that already includes six U.S. senators. ‘I think an awful lot of people in Congress are great at coming up with visions. They’re great at debating the issues; we need dreamers and debaters,’ Hickenlooper said. ‘I’m a doer. … I feel like I’m the one person that has actually gotten people together and gotten stuff done.’ U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris and former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro, who’ve both announced their candidacies, also spoke at a fundraiser for the Story County Democrats. Hickenlooper is nearing a formal bid following the completion of his second term as governor in January.”

De Blasio draws dozens in Sioux City - NYT: “He seemed at complete ease, shaking hands, posing for selfies and cracking tall guy jokes, as he laid out a plan for Democrats to take back the White House. Perhaps Bill de Blasio’s comfort level was aided by familiarity: This was believed to be his fourth trip to Iowa since he became mayor of New York City in 2014. It could have been the sparse crowd: Only about two dozen people braved blizzard-like conditions in Sioux City Saturday to attend the gathering organized by the Woodbury County Democrats, a traditional stop for presidential hopefuls. … There was no mention Saturday night of the difficulties he has had taming homelessness, repairing the city’s decrepit public housing or the fallout of the recent decision by Amazon to pull out of a plan to build a campus in Long Island City, Queens.”

GOP DONORS WORRY ABOUT TRUMP’S 2020 STRATEGY Politico: “Late last month, more than 100 major Republican donors gathered at the Trump International Hotel for a presentation from the president’s campaign manager Brad Parscale and other top political hands on their plans to keep the White House in 2020 after a brutal midterm election. But several of the GOP contributors left the two-day retreat in Washington dissatisfied, dogged by essentially the same concern: The president doesn’t really have a strategy to win reelection. They are chiefly worried about how he intends to prevail again in the Rust Belt states that voted for [President Trump] in 2016, but where Democrats performed strongly in last year’s midterms. But there are also concerns about whether the president’s fundraising apparatus is up to the task, and whether Trump will trample on any strategy or message the campaign does develop, as he frequently does. This account is based on interviews with nearly a dozen people connected to Trump’s reelection, including two donors who attended the retreat and other Republican contributors who’ve given to Trump in the past.”

To rate a Trump challenger, examine previous primaries - FiveThirtyEight: “One big question about 2020 is whether President Trump will face a serious primary challenger for the Republican presidential nomination. … Only one potential opponent has formally launched an exploratory committee — former Massachusetts Gov. Bill Weld — but there’s speculation that Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan might mount his own challenge to Trump. At this stage, this is good news for Trump. Arguably, neither Weld nor Hogan would pose that much of a threat. … It would be incredibly difficult for a primary challenger to actually defeat Trump and claim the GOP nomination… So if a credible opponent does emerge, it may make more sense to judge the campaign by the relative success of the challenger, such as how many votes the candidate wins… In other words, we can better understand just how serious — or not — a challenge to Trump is by comparing it to past primaries against incumbent presidents.”

HOUSE TO PRESSURE SENATE GOP ON TRUMP EMERGENCY AP: “The fight about President Donald Trump’s U.S.-Mexico border wall is heading to the GOP-controlled Senate, putting Republicans in the uncomfortable spot of deciding whether to back his declaration of a national emergency. Enough Republicans are chewing over whether to support Trump’s plan to create suspense about the vote and how the issue will play in the 2020 elections. … The resolution is almost certain to pass the Democratic-controlled House, which is expected to vote Tuesday. If it also survives the Senate, Trump would be expected to veto it. Congress is not expected to muster the two-thirds majority to override a veto, which means the Republican president’s declaration could move forward. But no president wants a rebuke from his own party. The math: The Senate is controlled by a 53-47 Republican majority. So it would take four Republicans voting with every Democrat to pass the measure and send it to Trump. More than four have voiced significant discomfort with Trump’s move.”

Dozens of ex-GOP lawmakers and national security pros oppose emergency - NYT: “More than 25 former Republican lawmakers and nearly 60 former senior national security officials appealed to Congress on Monday to kill President Trump’s declaration of a national emergency on the Mexican border, countering Republican leaders’ effort to hold down defections Tuesday on a scheduled House vote to block the president. ‘It has always been a Republican fundamental principle that no matter how strong our policy preferences, no matter how deep our loyalties to presidents or party leaders, in order to remain a constitutional republic we must act within the borders of the Constitution,’ wrote the former members of Congress, including Senators John Danforth, Chuck Hagel, Olympia J. Snowe and Richard Lugar, who implored Republicans to protect Congress’s constitutionally mandated power of the purse.”

COLORADO GOV TO SIGN BILL HACKING ELECTORAL COLLEGEThe Hill: “Colorado Gov. Jared Polis (D) will sign a measure to award his state’s electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote, moving a countrywide coalition one step closer to circumventing the Electoral College. In an interview Sunday, Polis called the Electoral College an ‘undemocratic relic’ of the nation’s past, one he wants to see relegated to the dustbin of history. ‘I’ve long supported electing the president by who gets the most votes,’ Polis told The Hill. ‘It’s a way to move towards direct election of the president.’ Colorado will become the 12th state to join the national popular vote interstate compact. Those 12 states and the District of Columbia, which has also passed a popular-vote bill, account for 172 electoral votes, [98] shy of the 270 votes a presidential candidate needs to win the White House.”

PLAY-BY-PLAYTrump heads to Vietnam for another round of NORK talks - Fox News

George Will: ‘Progressives are emulating Trump – and reality is leaking from American life’ - WaPo

AUDIBLE: LOLZ“The point with Trump is, he’s in on the joke.” – Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C in an interview with Mark Leibovich for the NYT, discussing the performative nature of the Trump presidency.

FROM THE BLEACHERS“OK, Chris, what is with the verb ‘woke’? You and Tucker Carlson use it often. Have the people in question been asleep?” –Margery Peterson, Salinas, Calif.

[Ed. note: The key, Ms. Peterson, is that in this sense it’s a noun rather than the traditional sense of “I woke the dog when I got up early for work,” where it is a verb. I think when “woke” the noun used un-ironically it is intended to mean something akin to the way Christians might use the term “born again.” The idea being that a person had been oblivious to certain questions of social justice but now have awoken to the injustices around them and will therefore think anew and act anew, i.e.: Don’t judge so-and-so because he used offensive terms in the past because he is now “woke” and acting in a socially conscious way. The term comes from the African American community, where it more specifically refers to the moment black Americans come to believe that that white racism is pervasive. The challenge thereafter is to “stay woke,” and, as rapper Meek Mill, put it in his 2018 song of the same name: “The odds against you and they double stacked, stay woke.” It’s about not allowing oneself to forget about racism. What makes the term so ripe for parody, though, is the way other social justice and left-wing groups and individuals have taken up the term. Like white-people dreadlocks and guys in pink pussy hats, white folks saying “woke” are easy targets for ridicule. When we use the term it’s not a taunt, though, but rather to refer to a certain category of liberal activists who are very public and deliberate in signaling their membership in the social justice community. Here’s how we used it in January: “So it seems for Harris and Booker, as well. The two of them were already jousting during the televised spectacle of the most recent Supreme Court confirmation hearings, trying to be the most woke and most brutal in their performances. Harris got the better of Booker then and, we expect, will be in good position to do so again.”]

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WHERE ARE WE GOING? OFF CAMPUS Fox News: “A University of Wisconsin-Madison fraternity was suspended after the chapter forced new members to wear a ‘Dora the Explorer’ backpack, among other requirements, the school announced Friday. A student-led Committee on Student Organizations made the decision to suspend Alpha Sigma Phi through March 24 and place the fraternity on probation until Dec. 11 because the requirements were tantamount to hazing, according to a school press release. According to the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, pledges were forced to wear the backpack, carry fruit around campus and do errands for older fraternity members. The fraternity can appeal the decision but will not be able to hold any activities.”

AND NOW, A WORD FROM CHARLES…“What is the border collie? A breed developed in the border country between England and Scotland for one thing only: its ability to herd sheep, though, if necessary, it can work cattle or hogs or even turkeys. (Our border collie, deprived of such gainful employment, likes to swim out to the middle of a pond and herd ducks.)” – Charles Krauthammer (1950-2018) writing in the Washington Post on July 15, 1994.

Conservative politicians, legal experts, and activist groups are rushing to the all-out defense of President Trump’s D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals nominee Neomi Rao, after a freshman Republican senator suggested he might vote against her confirmation because she may harbor pro-choice views.

Rao, who would take now-Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s vacated seat on the nation’s most influential appellate court, was questioned earlier this month by Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee concerning her past writings that implied intoxicated women might share some blame if they are raped. The defection of even a handful of conservatives could sink Rao’s confirmation in the Senate, where Republicans hold a slim 53-47 majority.

Missouri Republican Sen. Josh Hawley told Axios over the weekend that he had "heard directly from at least one individual who said Rao personally told them she was pro-choice." Hawley clarified: "I don’t know whether that’s accurate, but this is why we are doing our due diligence."

Rao, 45, currently serves as administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, and observers have said she’s played a key role in executing the Trump administration’s deregulation agenda. She would be the first South Asian woman to serve on a federal appeals court.

However, Rao has never tried a case in state or federal court, and some of her writings — including as a professor at the George Mason University School of Law, later renamed the Antonin Scalia Law School – are leading conservatives to raise last-minute concerns.

According to Hawley, Rao’s academic writings have indicated she may support the concept of "substantive due process," a legal framework that identifies constitutional rights not expressly provided by the text of the Constitution. Conservatives fiercely have opposed the use of substantive due process to provide for some rights, including the right to privacy and abortion, which are not stated in the constitutional text but instead are purportedly implied by it.

"I am only going to support nominees who have a strong record on life," Hawley told Axios. "To me, that means … someone whose record indicates that they have respect for what the Supreme Court itself has called the interests of the unborn child; someone whose record indicates they will protect the ability of states and local governments to protect the interests of the unborn child to the maximum extent … and number three somebody who will not extend the doctrines of Roe v. Wade and Casey, which I believe are deeply incompatible with the constitution."

Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey were the seminal Supreme Court cases to find and define a constitutional right to an abortion. But, conservatives and legal scholars are aggressively pushing back on Hawley’s concerns this week, saying variously that there is no evidence that Rao is pro-choice — and some are suggesting that even if she supports abortion rights, her personal views should not bar her from judicial service.

Carrie Severino, the Chief Counsel and Policy Director at the conservative Judicial Crisis Network, accused Hawley of continuing the policies of the Democrat he defeated last November, then-Sen. Claire McCaskill.

"Sadly, barely a month after moving to Washington, Josh Hawley is already acting like Claire McCaskill when it comes to judges," Severino said. "Instead of supporting President Trump’s top judicial nominee, he is spreading the very same kind of rumors and innuendo and character assassination that Republican leaders fought during Justice Kavanaugh’s confirmation. Hawley could be working to confirm her and other extraordinary nominees, but it seems he’d rather be making headlines.”

"Conservatives have argued long and correctly that professional qualifications and personal integrity, along with a basic commitment to the Constitution itself, should be the only determinants of nominees’ fitness for appointment to federal judgeships," Hillyer wrote. "In particular, conservatives have inveighed against any result-oriented, single-issue litmus tests for judges, especially for those below the level of the Supreme Court."

Neomi Rao smiling as President Trump announced his intention to nominate her to fill Brett Kavanaugh’s seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit last November. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)

In a statement, Club for Growth President David McIntosh praised Rao as an "originalist who is faithful to the Constitution," citing her work on deregulation in the Trump White House. McIntosh, whose organization is devoted to reducing taxes, also exalted Rao’s "extensive knowledge of administrative rulemaking."

“I have known Neomi for decades and have no doubt that she will be a principled jurist, cut from the same cloth as Justices Scalia and Thomas,” McIntosh said. "Senate Republicans should not be thrown off track by rumors and innuendo."

In a barrage of similar statements, other conservative luminaries lined up to defend Rao. Ed Meese, the former attorney general under President Ronald Reagan, said he also personally knew Rao and could vouch for her commitment to constitutional principles.

"I have had the privilege of knowing Professor Neomi Rao, and have observed her work, since she first started teaching at the Scalia Law School at George Mason University," Meese said. "She has made it her life’s work to support the Constitution as it is written, and she understands the proper judicial role in our society and what that requires of judges when they are interpreting the Constitution and the laws. I have no doubt that she will uphold the rule of law and not legislate from the bench."

Ralph Reed, the chairman of the nonprofit Faith and Freedom Coalition, which focuses on outreach to evangelicals, said he supported Rao’s confirmation and asserted that "her judicial philosophy is antithetical to federal judges issuing rulings untethered from the enumerated rights found in the Constitution."

Conservative groups also have ramped up spending with hundreds of thousands of dollars in media outreach to promote Rao, whose rocky confirmation hearing already gave some analysts cause for alarm. Democrats hammered Rao for working to kill regulations they helped champion, while Republicans questioned her past writings on sexual assault.

In a 1994 opinion column, Rao wrote: "Unless someone made her drinks undetectably strong or forced them down her throat, a woman, like a man, decides when and how much to drink. And if she drinks to the point where she can no longer choose, well, getting to that point was a part of her choice."

A good way to avoid a potential rape "is to stay reasonably sober," Rao added.

"To be honest, looking back at some of those writings … I cringe at some of the language I used," Rao told the Senate Judiciary Committee earlier this month, adding that writings in which she criticized affirmative action and suggested that intoxicated women were partly responsible for date rape did not reflect her current thinking.

"I like to think I’ve matured as a thinker, writer and indeed as a person," she said.

Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, who recently revealed she was raped by her boyfriend in college, said Rao’s writings "give me pause," in part because of the message they’ve sent to young women who may be reluctant to report a rape.

Fox News’ Alex Pappas and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Progressive groups are reaching out to 2020 Democratic presidential candidates to support their push to expand the number of Supreme Court justices in order to diminish the current conservative majority.

So far, the drive by the group named ‘Pack the Courts’ is getting two maybes from Democratic presidential contenders and a no from a likely White House hopeful.

“I don’t think we should be laughing at it,” South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg, a Democrat, said last week at an event in Philadelphia.

“Because in some ways it’s no more a shattering of norms than what’s already been done to get the judiciary to where it is today,” added Buttigieg, an Afghanistan War veteran who last month launched a presidential exploratory committee.

Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, who’s also launched a presidential exploratory committee, said last month on ‘Pod Save America’ that expanding the court or imposing term limits were “interesting ideas.”

But the move to increase the number of justices on the Supreme Court isn’t flying with likely White House contender Rep. Eric Swalwell.

“I wouldn’t. I think nine is good number. It’s worked for our country,” the four-term Democratic congressman from California told Fox News on Monday after he headlined ‘Politics and Eggs,” a must stop for White House hopefuls in New Hampshire.

“I don’t want to let these extraordinary times that President Trump has put us in lead us to too many extraordinary remedies,” the former prosecutor explained. “I’d rather see us go back to a country of following the law, having qualified justices, and depending on the systems of government that we already have in place, just making those systems more accountable and work better.”

‘Pack the Courts’ told Fox News it is meeting with Buttigieg on Monday evening. The group highlighted that it’s in the process of reaching out to Gillibrand, as well as the campaigns of presidential candidates Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Kamala Harris of California.

“We’re in the process of reaching to every declared Democratic contender and hope to both enlighten them to the importance of this strategy for taking back the Court and enlist their support for their strategy,” ‘Pack the Court’ campaign manager Kate Kendell said.

Kendell said her group has received a $500,000 grant from the Palm Center, a progressive-leaning but independent non-partisan think tank in California to fund research on controversial and provocative policy proposals. She added they’re now beginning to raise small-dollar donations from individuals to further fuel their effort to expand the number of high court justices.

The organization is partnering with ‘Demand Justice,’ another progressive group founded last year to try and counter GOP efforts to put more conservatives into federal courts.

‘Demand Justice’ director Brian Fallon – who served as press secretary for Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign – highlighted that “we strongly believe that reforming the Court — especially by expanding it — is the cornerstone for re-building American democracy."

But Republicans say advocating to expand the number of Supreme Court justices will make 2020 Democratic contenders appear more extreme to voters come the general election.

"Democrats are setting themselves up for failure in the general election by agreeing to every single progressive policy touted by the activist left including the Green New Deal, taxes on the wealthy, Medicare for All, and now packing the Supreme Court,” argued Sarah Dolan, executive director of the pro-GOP opposition research group ‘America Rising.’

The Judiciary Act of 1869 established the current number of nine justices for the Supreme Court. A push by President Franklin Roosevelt in 1937 to increase the number of justices failed.

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